A Pricking of Thumbs
by jmsutherland
Summary: Something wicked is turning the citizens of Ankh-Morpork against its Omnian minority, with possibly murderous consequences, and it's not something the Watch can fight on its own. An alliance of witches, werewolves, dwarves, trolls, vampires, igors, pictsies - and the odd assassin might do it. If a crusading newspaper can band them together, and love doesn't tear them apart.


**A Pricking of Thumbs**

 _High in one of the myriad and mysterious towers of Unseen University there came a tapping, as of someone gently rapping at a chamber door; only this and nothing more. Arch-chancellor Arcane Remembar –formerly Lecturer in Recent Runes- looked up from his papers._

" _Come!" he called, failing once again to achieve that strange mixture of "Enter" and "Go way!" that had seem to come so easily and naturally to Mustrum Ridcully, his late and vaguely lamented predecessor._

 _The Librarian knuckled his way across the floor and folded himself into the chair directly opposite the Arch-chancellor._

" _Good morning, Librarian," he began, "and what can I do for you today?"_

" _Ooook," said the Librarian, who had accidentally been transformed into an Orang-utan some years before and had since resisted any attempts to change him back._

" _Yes, I can see that." Like the rest of the staff he had learned to speak Orangish over the years. "What precisely is it that's bothering you?"_

" _Oook!"_

" _They often bother me too, but this is a university so at certain times there are bound to be students. It's unavoidable, I'm afraid."_

" _Ook, ook," said the Librarian petulantly._

" _Again, it is not without precedent for students to wish to visit the library. Though I'll admit it is unusual," he laughed, mirthlessly._

 _The Librarian was not amused, which he demonstrated by smiling, menacingly._

" _Oooook!" he protested._

" _Oh, I see," said Arcane, "it is the books themselves that are complaining, rather than you. Well that is a most serious situation. I shall call a meeting of the senior staff for this afternoon; I trust you will be able to attend."_

" _Ook," the Librarian affirmed, apparently mollified._

" _Until then, in that case," said Arcane._

 _The Librarian nodded his acknowledgement; then barrelled his way out of the door, slamming it gently behind him._

 _So, now, in addition to the fact that Hex, the CPU-continuing purpose unknown- in the Department of High-Energy Magic was seemingly spewing-out nonsense, or at least more nonsense than normal and the plague of "unidentified rash" –that was apparently afflicting the student body- there was this. For the third time that morning Arcane sighed deeply and wished he'd become a dustman._

 **Chapter 1**

The Pseudopolis Yard nick ran like a well-oiled machine. Admittedly, it was a machine that frequently broke down, needed constant maintenance and often had to have parts replaced, but it was always well-oiled. Especially when Nobby Nobbs was around. Captain Harry Mudd hadn't noticed Lance Constable Buttress move at all, but he knew he'd been spotted. That was the way with gargoyles.

When he'd first come to the city he'd thought they didn't move at all, ever. However, Commander Carrot had told him that, though they could sit perfectly still for years, when they did move it was faster than any human could see. But Harry wasn't just any human. For a number of reasons he suspected he had some vampire-blood in him. There was a time when he'd used to tell people that, but he'd stopped, as they always laughed at him. Anyway, he'd started paying more attention and had now, on a couple of occasions, seen gargoyles catching pigeons. Only just, because goodness they were fast.

So, in spite of not seeing Buttress move he knew that his arrival had been noticed, recorded and passed down the line. Sure enough, when he turned into the Yard Lance Constable Anthracite was standing rigidly to attention. Of course, being a Troll, whatever Anthracite did, he was pretty rigid while he was doing it.

"Mornin, Sur!" he rumbled.

"Good morning, constable," said Harry, returning his salute.

He didn't know how they did it. In the couple of seconds between his coming into the gargoyle's line of sight and his turning the corner, Buttress had managed to inform Anthracite of his imminent arrival so that the Troll was already saluting, because it took Constable Anthracite a couple of seconds to do that, even with a week's notice. It had to be a stone thing.

As Trolls were pretty much made out of stone and Gargoyles looked as if they'd been carved out of stone he'd speculated that perhaps Gargoyles were carved out of Troll. Even Lance Constable Smite –Smite the Unbeliever With the Wisdom of thy Words- could spot the gigantic flaw in that one.

"Ok," he'd said, "even supposing you could somehow tie a Troll down for long enough to do the carving. He'd get free eventually and come after you. And who'd be mad enough to want to do something like that in the first place?"

Constable Smite, being Omnian, knew a lot about wanting to do mad things, so if even he thought the idea was mad then it was probably mad-squared. Smite was currently courting a nurse from Morpork Mercy called Shame –Shame the Infidel with the Beauty of thy Virtue. It seemed to Harry to be very odd relationship. Lance Constable Smite and Nurse Shame hardly ever met and, when they did, they barely looked at each other and hardly spoke. On this evidence he wondered how Omnians ever managed to make little Omnians. Though it was clear that they did, as there were certainly a lot of them around the city these days. And what was undeniable was that: with their platinum hair and their coffee skin; their noble bearing and beautiful features, they looked like gods' chosen people. Harry knew there were many strange gods up on Dunmanifestin, but he thought it a particularly odd one who would make such stunning-looking people ashamed to look at each other.

So, Gargoyles weren't carved Trolls. Trolls living in the icy winds near The Hub were not only smart, they were quick and nimble, but nothing like Gargoyle speed. And, though Buttress could have nipped down off the roof, told Anthracite, and got back up faster than a human eye could follow, Harry would have seen him. They had to be communicating some other way. Still, it was a mystery that would have to wait.

Sergeant Boltmaker was on the desk and she tipped her helmet at him. Boltmaker was an older woman, not one of these frivolous, fifty-year-old girls, like Littlebottom or Deepdelver who wore high-heels and makeup and suchlike. In fact the only clue that Boltmaker was actually female was the two little bows she had tied in her beard. And they were made of wire. Not that he had anything against Sergeant Littlebottom, of course. Cheery's lab and Doctor Igor's autopsy suite were the two most efficient things in the Watch. Or any other Watch, for that matter. These days Cheery only ever left her lab to visit murder sites. Igor never saw any reason to leave Autopsy as they brought the murder sites to

"Anything important today, Sergeant?" he asked.

"Yes, sir," replied Boltmaker, "the Commander wants to see you as soon you come in."

"I'm intrigued," said Harry.

"I'd be worried, "said Boltmaker.

This was worrying. If the stories were to be believed, Boltmaker wasn't worried when a mineshaft collapsed on top of her, trapping her up to her neck for six days. Or when she was cornered and attacked by three Trolls out of their outcrops on Slab. In both cases she was reported to have said: "But I wasn't alone, my axe was with me."

So, if she was worried it was, well, worrying.

Then suddenly there was a waft of something sweet and dank and alluring. He turned and caught a glimpse laced-up, shapely calf and was lost.

"I'll get right on it, Sergeant," he said, absently, but his mind was all on Sally.

Sergeant von Humpeding had been the first vampire on the watch and it hadn't been easy for her. Initially even Commander Vimes and Sergeant Angua had been against her, as had everyone else. No one likes a bloodsucker, or trusts them. Yet she'd come through it and proved them all wrong. Now she was a highly-valued officer of the watch. She also tormented his dreams and a great many of his waking hours too. But then he was hardly alone in that.

It didn't seem possible for her to have an ample bosom and generous hips one minute, but a slender, coltish figure the next. She could flash her eyes at you like a seductive, older woman; but look again and it was the face of an angelic boy. Albeit the type of boy that certain schoolmasters shouldn't be allowed anywhere near.

Sergeant Angua had seen the affect she had on all the males in the Watch, even the Trolls, and tried to put a stop to it. First she'd said that Sally wasn't allowed to wear black lipstick, or black nail-varnish on her fingers and toes. She'd had to drop that when the Black Ribboners objected that it was the equivalent of saying that Dwarfs couldn't have beards. Next she objected to her wearing such short skirts. Until she measured them and found them to be no shorter than anyone else's. Harry had to admit that they certainly looked shorter. A lot shorter. Eventually Angua had given up. Maisy Midden, the cleaner, said she'd heard her explaining it to Commander Vimes:

"We could dress her in old sacks and pour ashes over her head and she'd still look stunning. It's allure. She was born that way and there is nothing anyone can do about it, not even her.

For her part Sally was fed-up to the sharp teeth with "allure". Oh, it was great if you wanted lure someone into a trap so that you could suck their blood. That was why they'd evolved the way they had. But it was a right pain in the elbow if all you wanted was to go down the shops for some bread. And there were men and women queuing up to be her victims. And not attractive ones either. It was fine if you lived in Themiddleofwherestadt, Überwald. There you could pick and choose who you wanted to entrap. But in somewhere as crowded as Ankh-Morpork people were falling over each other to throw themselves into traps you hadn't even laid.

It wasn't as though she hadn't tried: floppy hats, loose-fitting blouses, baggy trousers… But as soon as she walked out of the door her morphogenic field would take over. The hat would become small and stylish, the blouse was suddenly a crop-top to show-off her belly-button and the trousers were three-quarter length and skin-tight. The most voluminous and unflattering of dresses pinched its waist and dropped its neckline within seconds of her putting it on. There was nothing she could wear that didn't make her look like she'd like to be wearing nothing. And that was another problem.

If the attention became too annoying, or sometimes for purely police reasons, she could vanish into a mist, or into a lot of bats. However, unlike Vlad or Otto Chreik, when she re-materialised she didn't do it fully-clothed. She'd lost track of the number of times she'd had to walk back through The Shades without a stich on. On the other hand, if you're a helpless girl stranded, naked, in the most dangerous parts of a dangerous city, then being a vampire has many advantages. Though The Shades was still a very dangerous place, it was safe if you were a frail young woman on her own with no clothes on. Word spread quickly in The Shades and there was no point in taking suicidal risks. Some people can spot a trap, even when there isn't one there.

And another thing about her affect on the male, of several species, was that she couldn't actually see the attraction herself. Naturally, there was no point in looking in the mirror but she kept a portrait of herself that her mother had done when she was young. She wasn't ugly, of course, whatever that meant, but looked rather gaunt, she thought and, really, a bit ferrety. And that was her own mother who was, presumably, inclined to be flattering in her depiction of her daughter. But that had been over a hundred years ago; she had no idea what she looked like now, any more than anyone else did. Apart, perhaps, from Harry Mudd.

Like almost every male on the Disc -and every female- he looked at her with desire in his eyes. The difference was that he didn't do it in the normal, wide-eyed that made people look as though they'd been mesmerised. It was as if he could see through the allure at what she actually was and fancied her anyway. It was rather intriguing, but it would have been an impossible relationship. There was the age-difference for one thing: he was late-twenties; she was a hundred and forty-eight. They wouldn't like the same music. On the other hand, her best female –in fact her only female friend- was a werewolf married to a six-foot-two Dwarf, so you never knew.

Angua now had two children: three-year-old Wolfgang –named for Angua's grandfather- and little Ironhammer, who was named after Carrot's mother. Sally was even Ire's godsmother. As Angua had put it: "I can't think of anyone better able to watch over her than a woman who'll live forever and could rip a man's head off with one hand, can you?" Her soft-skills hadn't really figured, though she really was working on them though; along with her domestic talents. She so much wanted to be a "normal" woman that she'd even lied about her age. Only Angua knew that she wasn't really fifty-five.

However, though she could "feel other people's pain", because she'd caused enough of it in her time, and "see things from another's point of view", because she could take over their minds, it turned out that cooking and cleaning weren't quite so straightforward. It wasn't that she couldn't do it. She cleaned her apartment every other day, though something deep in her blood cried out against dusting and clearing spider's webs. And she was, she was told, a superb cook. It was just that there was something fundamentally wrong with her even trying. Angua had said it was like watching someone in a ballgown and a tiara doing the washing-up. These were things done by Igors or pale, young wenches, and not by someone whose name is three-pages long. But was that really any odder than a werewolf changing nappies and knitting booties?

There was nothing Salacia liked more than a morning, after a tough night-shift, spent chatting to Angua and playing with the children. She could almost hear generations of ancestors turning in their graves at such an offence to vampire-kind, and the problem with her ancestors was that one they had stopped turning they might climb out of their graves and come and get her. But before any of that there had to be breakfast at Bernie's.

Bernie the Butcher had been the most feared gangster in Morpork before Sally met him. Ankh had a different class of gangster; not better, just different. The Thieves Guild had apparently taken out a contract on him with the Assassins Guild, but even they couldn't frighten him, or even touch him. And then he and Sally had had a chat. It was the making of her reputation. As far as everyone was concerned she had taken a terrifying, murderous thug, and turned him into a respectable purveyor of fresh meats. Only she and Bernie knew that he'd been dying to get out of the gangster business for years and the only thing stopping him had been the prospect of, well, dying. In a long and nefarious career he had simply made too many enemies to simply hang up his cleaver and go quietly into retirement. And that's where Sally came in, because she had a proposition for him.

If a rumour could get around that there was something so utterly terrifying that it scared even Bernie the Butcher, then it'd probably scare a lot of other people as well. More importantly, it would probably frighten them off from seeking revenge on Bernie too. And Sally could appear in many scary guises and do a lot of scary things inside people's heads. Never mind the scary things she could physically do to them, if they were too stupid to run away.

And so, Bernie the Butcher shut up shop and opened another as… a butcher. It's what he'd trained as when he was young, after all, and how he'd got his nickname and it had just kind of stuck, and had also sounded suitably menacing in his new line of work. He'd never actually butchered anyone, but you couldn't blame people for jumping so far to the wrong conclusion that they missed the sandpit altogether. Mind you, he'd broken more than his fair share of bones in his time; he was no Omnian Sister of Kindness, to be fair.

It all gone pretty smoothly. A couple of people had come round needing to settle old scores and he'd settled them. Some with monetary reparation; some in other ways. And Sally had put the frighteners on all the rest, quite literally. But all that had been right at the beginning; everything was quiet now. Bernie was a respectable small-businessman with a wife and family and he had Sally to thank for it. Making sure that Sergeant von Humpeding had the very best cuts from the very best beef-cattle to be found on the Sto Plains was the least he thought he could do in return.

For some unfathomable reason friends seem to enjoy going through little rituals where they say the same things to each other every time they meet and then laugh. They think other people find this endearing. They're wrong.

"Morning, Sally," said Bernie, "what can I get you?"

"Steak sandwich, hold the bread," she replied.

"How would you like it?"

"Raw."

It wasn't a substitute; it wasn't intended to be: the blood was cold and the meat was so tender you could have eaten it with rubber teeth, buts gods it was good. She'd often had to put up with the taunts of others that there was something shamefully human somewhere in her lineage. She didn't know if there was a substance to them but if there were she was sure that filet steak was speaking to her "inner-woman".

The Carrots didn't lock their door –there really was no one suicidally stupid enough, even in Ankh- Morpork…- and she and Angua were now such good friends that she never bothered knocking, yet when she walked into the room Angua looked shocked.

"What's wrong?" asked Sally, alarmed.

"You've got blood on your fangs!"

"Oh, that," she said, taking out a napkin and wiping her mouth, "that's just breakfast."

"Anyone, I know," laughed Angua.

"Not funny, my furry friend."

"Sorry," Angua didn't apologise, "Ire's teething and I've got teeth on the brain at the moment."

"Well, if she has her mother's teeth I can see how that would be a problem."

Angua laughed again: "Shall we declare peace?"

"Done. Where is she, by the way?"

"Sleeping, for once, thank gods."

"And Wolfie?"

"Wrecking someone else's house with a bunch of other little boys at a birthday party."

"Hmmm, so what are we going to do?"

"Do you drink…vine?"

"At eight-thirty in the morning!?"

"Well, if you're not going to have a drink when you get off work, when are you going to have one? Unless you do not drink…vine."

"No," said Sally, " I'm OK with…vine. Especially after vurk. What's your excuse?

"I'm the mother of two small children whose husband is a policeman. What more excuse do I need? But I'm having one glass and you're finishing the bottle.

"Well," said Sally, "when you put it like that…"

Angua raised her glass: "To tonight!" she said.

"What's happening tonight?" asked Sally.

"You're coming to dinner."

"That'll be nice for me, but my mother shall be furious that I didn't send a thank you letter for your kind invitation."

"I'm sure she'll understand as I've only just invited you. How is the Lady Lachrimosa, by the way?"

"Oh, that's nice, give her my love. I haven't seen her since the wedding."

Like most Überwald weddings, that of Carrot and Angua had been a strained affair. Though this particular one was as strained as a crossbow-string poised on the verge of driving a bolt through someone's skull. It almost strained the word "strained". But, of course, Absolutely Everyone simply had to be there. Angua had got along rather well with Sally's mum. Better than with Carrot's at least.

"Will it be just we three?"

"Not on this occasion," said Angua, adopting Sally's lofty tone, "we shall be joined by Hartmut Albrecht Lothar Verführung Lang-Eckzahn von Dreck und Messing.

"Doesn't tinkle any chimes. Though, I feel that it should."

"Well, you work with him."

Sally frowned and thought for a second; then her eyes went wide.

"Harry Mudd!? So, he's been lying about his name?"

"Yes, and you're not the only one who's been lying about their age."

"What do you mean?"

"My husband has been doing some investigating, as is his habit, and he thinks Captain Mudd a.k.a. Herr von Dreck und Messing may be older than he says. A lot older.

"I'm intrigued."

"So are we; that's why he's coming to dinner."

"Ah, fiendish. Do you mind if I cook tonight?"

"We were rather counting on it."

Angua's cooking might charitably be described as "competent". Even the Disc's forgiving heart could not describe Carrot's efforts even as "incompetent". It's was rumoured that he could fry water.

"Ok, I'll finish my wine and go shopping."

"I once didn't sleep for two years; I'm sure I'll manage."

"And the Guild of Weather-Diviners predicts bright sunshine."

"Damn! I hate the rain."

"Mmmm, Sal?"

"Yeees?" said Sally, immediately suspicious.

"Would you wear something restrained this evening?"

"No."

"Well, would you at least try to wear something not too sexy?"

"What would be the point?"

"Fair enough. Then can we have steak for dinner?"

"Oh, Sally, please."

"No! Carrot would only want it "well-done" and the last time he did that it made me cry. We're having fish."

Sally could sneer "well-done" so that you could hear the inverted-commas.

"I did think it was odd of you to cry."

"Well, it was either that or bite him."

 **Chapter 2**

Anges supposed she should have been grateful that it was the way it was. When it was going to be a fairly straightforward birth, or when the injury or illness wasn't too serious. Or when young girls were enquiring about love, whether in its ethereal, or its more urgent manifestations, they usually came to Mistress Nitt. But when they weren't sure how the birth would go; when they worried that an illness might end up with Him coming to the door, in fact whenever they thought they wouldn't like what they were going to hear. They preferred to hear it from Mistress Aching.

There were lots of advantages too: she got invited to all the weddings –everyone wanted a witch to say a blessing- and all the baby-namings –for the same reason- while Tiffany attended all the funerals. Also, though she was "pleasantly plump", she could see the way a lot of young men looked at her and knew that, if and when she chose, marriage and children lay in her future. And she didn't need a crystal-ball for that. Whereas Tiffany would be _Mistress_ Aching until the day she died.

And it wasn't as if she wasn't respected –she'd learned from Granny Weatherwax after all- but she was respected in the way that Nanny Ogg was. Now, this was no mean thing in itself, and she knew she had the best of the deal all the way down the line but, somewhere deep inside –and there was a lot of her to be inside of- she hankered for that look of terrified awe that people looked at Tiffany with.

She knocked at the door and heard Nanny shout: "Come in, dearie!" from somewhere inside. Tiffany was already pouring the tea; with a "little extra something" in Nanny's cup. Just to keep out the cold. It was lucky that for the short time that Nanny wasn't going to be waited on by one or more of her daughters-in-law –or granddaughters-in-law- she had the two young witches to wait on her instead.

Back when it had been Granny and Magrat the had met out on the mountain. But now, what with Nanny's rheumatism, and arthritis, and lumbago, and one thing and another…well, it only made sense to meet in Nanny's cottage instead. Neither Tiffany nor Agnes believed in any of these ailments, anymore than Nanny believed they did, but they figured she'd earned.

"Just a bit more medicine, my chic," said Nanny, as Tiffany added a few more drops of scumble to her tea.

No one apart from Nanny spoke to Tiifany like that. In fact she doubted there were many people on the Disc who would have dared to. At least, not more than once.

"Hi, Aggie," said Tiffany, "would you like some tea?"

"Yes, please," replied Agnes, "but without the apple juice."

Tiffany laughed in that lovely, little-girl way that only she and Nanny ever heard anymore. Ever since Tiffany had moved in to Granny Weatherwax's old cottage all the old frivolity had left her. She wasn't sad; she wasn't miserable, she was just…serious. She had a lot of things to do and they weren't funny, any of them. Except going round to Nanny's house.

They sat down and did what witches have done all down the ages: address the problems of their community. Only ignorant men would call it gossip. Fortunately, this could be done over tea and delicious cakes –all gifts- in front of a roaring fire, in a cosy cottage. Agnes was sure that even Tiffany preferred this to dancing around on a windswept heath without her drawers on.

First, the essential business had to be conducted and assignments divided-up, then they could relax. For example, Tiffany was going to be paying a visit to a farmer who had been paying the wrong kind of attention to his daughter. She almost pitied him.

"Right now, dearies," cackled Nanny, "you both know I'm a lying, old baggage…and you don't have to go nodding that quick."

They both laughed, but Nanny was just smiling, wryly, which wasn't like her.

"I take it that there's something on your mind, Nanny," said Tiffany

"What little of it I've got left," Nanny laughed, "But you're right. Listen, my chicks, if you haven't seen it yet then it must be a long ways away, but a witch can always foresee her own death. Have you seen yours, Tiff?"

"Yes."

"Aggie?"

"Yes."

"So, when I tell you that mine is getting close you'll know that, for once, I'm not lying."

They were all quiet and serious for a minute; then Nanny broke the mood by cackling again and asking for more tea and scumble before going on.

"What I'm talking about is tradition," she said, being unusually serious, "the three ages of woman: the maiden, the mother and the crone. Magrat, me and Esme. Since Esme died and Magrat got in the family way I've been doing two jobs, but at least there were still three of us. There won't be for much longer and it's up to you two to find a third. And I mean a girl, one with the "talent", to be trained-up by one of you two." She paused, took a drink of tea, smacked her lips and went on:

"Now, I don't want to go making any assumings but if one of you is every going to be a mum it's our Aggie."

Agnes blushed, actually, so did Tiffany, and she couldn't for the life of her think why. However, they both nodded.

"Right," Nanny continued, "that's sorted. Now, it ain't happening tomorrow or anything like that, I've got a little while to go yet, but I've got another reason for wanting to talk about it now and I think our Tiff knows what it is."

Agnes looked at Tiffany, who looked both perplexed and shifty, which was a look Agnes hadn't thought possible.

"I was talking to a certain tall, dark stranger the other night, when I was sitting –up with old Mrs. Whittling. I think He'd just come from you, Tiff. Weren't you with the furrow baby?"

Tiffany looked surprised, but nodded. Agnes was completely mystified.

"He has an interesting way of talking," continued Nanny, "He doesn't say much, but when he does talk, then you listen:

"I DO NOT NORMALLY HAVE OPINIONS, MRS. OGG, AS YOU KNOW," he says to me, "BUT I THINK WHAT IS HAPPENING NOW IS EVIL.

"Now what do you suppose He meant by that?"

Between them Agnes and Tiffany were acquainted with most of the forms of wickedness known to human, dwarf, troll, gnome, elf, werewolf, goblin, orc and vampire-kind. And yet even they sat there pale, wide-eyed and open-mouthed.

Moonlight Smith had been naughty again, apparently. She wasn't pretty, she wasn't cute, she wasn't good, she wasn't nice, she wasn't sweet, she wasn't deferential, she wasn't bubbly, she wasn't obedient, she wasn't coy and she wasn't corrigible. There was nothing she could do about the first two, nor the last, but she tried with all the others, she really tried.

They had tried hurting her by: beating her with canes and belts and sticks. They had tried humiliating her by: making her stand in the corner with a dunce's cap on, or kneel with her arms outstretched, or stand on a stool, infront of the whole class. But whatever they did to her, that infuriating look of defiance was still there.

For her part, Moonlight knew that she shouldn't call Molly Miller or Billy Piper stupid, but they did say such stupid and hurtful things. And she only punched Katy Hopkins when she bullied other children. But then she'd known the rules were there and that she'd broken them. But she didn't know what she she'd done this time.

What Moonlight couldn't see was that the problem her teachers had with her was not her behaviour –which was exemplary, by anybody's standards- but with the fact that she was more intelligent than any of them, and by a long way.

Mrs. Glamp had been demonstrating a long-multiplication on the board when Moonlight had piped-up:

"I think you've made a mistake, miss."

"Are you saying I can't do arithmetic, Smith?"

"No, miss, you just made a mistake."

"Seventeen twenty-eights, eh?" demanded Mrs. Glamp.

"Four hundred and seventy-six," replied Moonlight, immediately.

"Wrong!" said ," not so clever now, are we? Get out and clean this board, now!"

Mrs. Glamp had no idea whether the answer was correct or not, but she could now see the error she'd made in the sum on the board herself and wanted the evidence erased as quickly as possible. Without anyone realising that was what she was doing."

Moonlight dutifully did as she was told and was then led outside by the ear.

And that was why she was now standing in the playground, in the rain, in her bare feet.

Of course, she was always in her bare feet, because she didn't own any shoes, but at least she had the excuse of being an orphan. The ones she felt sorry for were the children who had parents and still didn't have any shoes. The one person she never felt sorry for was herself. The Potters had agreed to take her in again for a while. They were a nice old couple and it meant she's get fed and a bed, and maybe even some shoes. She had done last time they put her up, but that had been a while ago and the shoes had long-since fallen apart. What did she have to complain about?

Not far away Tiiffany and Agnes stood watching her as she scowled to herself. If anyone had looked really carefully they'd have noticed that the rain wasn't actually touching their black, pointy hats. It was not the sort of magic that either Granny Weatherwax or Nanny Ogg would have approved of, of course, but it wasn't the Century of the Fruitbat any more, after all.

"Are you sure she's the one?" asked Agnes.

"Aren't you?" said Tiffany.

"Oh, well, I think so," Agnes admitted.

"And I think there may be more to her than even we think."

"What do you mean?"

"You know that Granny always said that witching was just headology?"

"Most of it is."

"But not all of it," said Tiffany.

"No, not all of it," agreed Agnes, aware as she was of the fact that her clothes were bone-dry in the midst of the downpour.

"Well, when I look at little Moonlight I get a sense that she's important. Very, very important."

"So, are you going to take her home now?"

"Yes, if she'll come."

"Why wouldn't she? What reasons could she have?"

"Yes, but I can't."

"Well, that should tell you all you need to know."

"Right. I'll come over in a couple of weeks to see how you're getting on."

"Or come back here tomorrow if she won't come with me."

"She'll come with you, she's not stupid.

"No," agreed Tiffany, "she is very far from being stupid."

"Bone," said Agnes, "au revoir. That's Genuan for…"

"I know what it means," said Tiffany, testily, "I'm not stupid either."

"Hmm, really, are you absolutely sure?" Then Agnes jumped on her broom and was gone.

Tiffany walked over to the little girl, who by now couldn't have been wetter had she been lying in the river. Her red hair was a dripping curtain over her face.

"Hello," said Tiffany, "are you Moonlight Smith?"

Two skinny arms came up and the hands at the end of them parted the curtains, to reveal two bright-green eyes looking up from a deeply-freckled, and deeply-suspicious, face.

"Yes, miss," said Moonlight, ever polite.

"My name id Tiffany Aching," said Tiffany Aching.

"I know who you are, miss."

"Do you think you know why I'm here?"

"No, miss," said Moonlight, "how can you be dry?" She really had no control over her own curiosity.

"I'm a witch," said Tiffany, "and I need an apprentice.

"Oh," said Moonlight.

Neither of them said anything for a few seconds and then Moonlight's eyes suddenly went wide.

"Oh! Do you want me?!" she asked, incredulously.

She was used to people prepared to take her on, for a while, often grudgingly, as one feels compelled to share part of a common burden. But she couldn't remember the last time that anyone had actually wanted her.

"Yes, would you like to come now?"

"Oh, yes, yes, yes please!" But then she paused and frowned. "But the Potters will be expecting me."

It surprised Tiffany that this little orphan's first thought was that she might be letting someone else down. She'd soon get used to it.

"I'm sure they'll understand, once I explain it to them," she reassured her, "is there anything else?"

"No, miss. Is it a long walk to where you live?"

From beneath her cloak she produced a hood and cape for the shivering child.

"Yes, it is," she said, "but we shalln't be walking. I've brought my broom."

"Yippee!" shrieked Moonlight, before clamping her hand over her mouth.

It was the most exhilarating thing she'd ever experienced. But then you don't have to be a destitute, orphaned drudge for a ride on a broomstick to be a stand-out thrill. She was so dizzy after it that Mistress Aching had to hold her up, or she's never have been able to walk to the cottage. And what a cottage! As soon as she walked through the door she was in love. It was so warm. The fire roaring in the hearth, and chairs round that lovely table, and such smells: a stew of some kind and bread and… The thoughts were falling over each other in Moonlight's head as they fought for attention.

"Ok," said Tiffany, "let's get you dried and changed and the we'll eat. You must be starving."

Normally when people say that it's just a figure of speech, but looking a Moonlight's bone-then arms and legs, it wasn't much of an exaggeration. She took the girl up to the smaller of the two bedrooms, the one she's already packed with children's clothes – people were often very generous to witches. Despite what she had said to Agnes she had never entertained any thought that Moonlight might reject her offer, any more than she thought she might be insane.

"This is your room," Tiffany said, pushing open the door.

"MY room," said Moonlight, in a voice that suggested the words were simply too outlandish to belong in her mouth.

"Underwear and stockings in here," Tiffany continued, pointing to a small chest of drawers. "Dresses, cardigans, coats and shoes in the wardrobe, and towels in here, " she concluded, patting a little chest at the foot of the bed.

"Shoes?!" was all the pop-eyed Moonlight could manage.

"Now, you dry your hair and put some clothes on and then we'll have something to eat."

As far as she could see –and she really could see, very clearly- up until about a minute ago, Moonlight's entire wardrobe consisted of one dress, so threadbare that it was virtually transparent and nothing else, not even drawers. Now, though she had a whole wardrobe-full of dresses to choose from, she was downstairs almost before Tiffany herself. It wasn't as though she wasn't fully-dressed, she was: dress, jumper, stockings, shoes, towel round her head and, no doubt, underwear as well. It was just that it looked as though she pulled on the first thing that came to hand. Even her stockings were different colours, and she was wearing odd shoes. There was clearly only one thing on Moonlight's mind, but she was very careful not to appear ungrateful.

"The room is lovely, thank you, miss," she said, eagerly watching Tiffany stirring the stew. "And the clothes are lovely too, miss," she continued, as she followed Tiffany taking the bread from the oven…

Tiffany thought that watching Moonlight eat was almost more nutritious as than eating yourself. She didn't rush at it and gorge herself, as she'd expected, but rather ate slowly, savouring every mouthful, like a condemned man enjoying his final meal. Accompanied by a great many "MMMMs". And when she had wiped her plate clean with her last piece of bread, she didn't ask for more. Of course when Tiffany asked:

"Would you like another helping?"

She piped-up: "Yes, please, miss! It's delicious!"

It was only after fifths that she finally had to concede:

"No, thank you, miss, I'm completely full. It's the best meal I've ever eaten."

Tiffany was fairly sure this wasn't an exaggeration.

Once Moonlight had drained her third mug of milk and Tiffany her single mug of ale –it was her one indulgence- they curled up opposite each other in the armchairs by the fire with mugs of tea.

"This has been my best day, ever, miss," said Moonlight, smiling that huge smile that you couldn't help copying.

Of course, a princess of Tsort might be impressed with a broomstick-ride over the Ramtops, but Tiffany was pretty sure she could have taken that out and it would still make Moonlight's top ten. She sympathised with the little girl for two main reasons: she could remember what it had been like to be her, and that Moonlight didn't want her sympathy.

"Moonlight's a bit formal to call you if we're going to be living together, I think, don't you?" she asked. Moonlight nodded, ever obedient. "So, what do your friends call you?"

"I don't have any friends, miss."

"What, none at all!?"

"No miss. I did have one once."

"And what did she call you?"

"Moo."

Tiffany wondered just how young had been when she'd last had a friend.

"Do you mind if I call to you Moo?"

"No, miss, I'd like that, miss. What's your name, miss?"

"My name is Tiffany," she said sternly, "as well you know. But you may continue to call me Miss."

"Sorry, miss," said Moo, looking suitably abashed.

"No need to apologise. You were simply testing the waters, as I would have done. Don't do it again."

"No, miss," whispered Moo. She couldn't believe she'd risked the best chance she's ever had, just because she couldn't keep he trap shut.

"How old are you, Moo?"

"Nine miss, I think." It looked like she might have got away with it.

"And what do you think you are going to learn from me?"

"Lessons, miss."

Tiffany frowned, but this time the girl who wasn't sure how old she was, and probably hadn't had a friend since was a toddler, was being entirely ingenuous.

"Indeed," agreed Tiffany, " but they won't be about casting spells or flying broomsticks. At least not to start with. They'll be about how to measure the height of a tree without having to climb it; where Genua is and the language they speak there and the history of dwarfs and the trolls and the elves…" By now Moo's eyes were as big as plates. "But that's for tomorrow. Can you cook, Moo?"

"A little bit, miss."

"Then we'll start there, but now it's bedtime. You can leave your mug on the table and do the washing-up in the morning. You'll find nightdresses in the same chest as the underwear. Sleep well."

Moo was used to being dismissed, but she couldn't remember being happier to be sent to bed. She couldn't actually remember when she's last had a bed to be sent to.

When Tiffany came down in just after dawn she was very pleasantly unsurprised to find that Moo had not only done the washing-up but that she had also cleaned out the fire and re-laid it –though not re-lit it- and was sweeping the floor. What did surprise her was that she was wearing an apron, when Tiffany didn't realise she owned any.

"Moo, why have you got bare feet!?" she scolded.

Moo looked like someone used to being told off for doing nothing wrong and Tiffany felt immediately guilty. They said "sorry" simultaneously.

"You really shouldn't go barefoot, except in the Summer, "she hoped to explain, "unless the fire's on…"

She was really having trouble facing Moo's hurt look and finally had to concede:

"I'm sorry, darling, I shouldn't have snapped like that. Go and put some stockings on while I make breakfast."

Moo had been a bit upset by Mistress Aching talking to her so harshly, but had been more than mollified by her saying "sorry". People so seldom said that to her. But the fact that she had called her "darling" had almost made her cry. And moonlight didn't cry.

 **Chapter 3**

Patrick Thissel had had to drop out of Assassins School, literally, at midnight, from a fourth floor window, on a rope pursued by, well, assassins. His father, the former Lord Edgar Ravenswood had made what had suddenly, and terminally, turned out to be the wrong sort of enemies. In such cases it was accepted practice –call it a charming old tradition if you will- to also eliminate any heirs, lest at some later time they should feel inclined to seek revenge. In truth Patrick a.k.a. Richard Ravenswood, had had about as much affection for his late father as for his last bout of Klatchian-deli belly. But he wasn't going to hang about to explain that to his pursuers, as he would likely find himself hanging about the walls of the Guild, by his neck.

No, he was much safer working behind the bar at The Duck and Run, though when he told people that they generally waited for the punchline. It wasn't technically in The Shades, but it was close enough to attract all the least-right sort of people. In the fact clientele of The Duck was all the people who'd been barred from everywhere else, including The Mended Drum and Biers. And that was fine with Patrick, because that was how he'd got the job. The landlady, Cutthroat Kate, had told him that the perfect employee for The Duck was, anyone who was prepared to work in The Duck. Patrick rather liked. It certainly attracted a better of person than The Guild School, because that was a place for the sons of gentlemen. And, to be fair, between them Kate and he had managed to terrify most of the patrons into being, if not civilised, then slightly less barbarous.

All of which made his friendship with Lance-Constable Smite even more peculiar. Everything had been odd about it from the moment of their first meeting. He'd been walking back from Harga's House of Ribs one night –he was prepared to do just about anything for Kate, except eat her food- when he came a mugging. Eight thugs were laying into one poor Omnian. Omnians were unmistakable, which was what made them such easy targets. Given the odds the Omnian was actually defending himself rather well, but that's all he was doing. He was fending off the blows; he wasn't hitting them back. And then they had him down and were sticking the boot in. Still, it was none of Patrick's business. He had three-quarters turned away when something stopped him. Could it have been the prick of conscience? Nah! He'd been educated out of that at school. No, these lumps were removing his waste products. They were so inept that they offended his professional pride, and the then one of the thugs spotted him:

"Oi, what d'you fink your lookin at!?"

Patrick shrugged. He remembered thinking: "Oh, well, I could use the exercise."

The _fight_ had lasted about twenty seconds. Three years' unarmed-combat training at The Assassins Guild against eight Morpork maulers was hardly a contest. He was so annoyed that he hadn't had a workout that he'd been tempted to take his frustration out on the hapless muggers when instead he did something he couldn't explain even now, even to himself. He picked up the Omnian and took him to Morpork Mercy.

There had been time; not that long ago, when it would have been kinder to leave the poor devil in the street rather than take him to a hospital. Now though, with the advent of Igor doctors , Omnian nurses and generous endowments from the Vimes Foundation, hospitals in general – and Morpork Mercy in particular- were places of caring and cleanliness; and even healing

The green lamp was burning brightly over the door of Emergency when he got there and there was an Igor and a nurse waiting at the door with a gurney. He supposed that it was only natural that, what with his upbringing and all, that he should be suspicious of people who wanted simply to take care of others. But he was suspicious of people who simply wanted to take care of other people.

They wheeled him into an examination room so that Igor could examine him and the nurse could ask a few preliminary questions:

"Is he a friend of yours," she asked.

"Nnnnn?"

"The patient; is he a friend?" she repeated

"I…No, he was attacked. I helped him."

"That was kind of you. Would you like to stay with him?"

"Er, yes. If I may."

"you are a very good man."

Patrick really didn't give a damn about the patient. The nurse whom he'd just met was simply the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen in his life, by a factor of… beyond his ability to calculate. His brain felt like it was rattling around inside his head so that he could barely focus on Igor who had started to speak. Even when he did manage to focus on Igor's face, he wasn't sure he had. That was often the way with Igors.

"Hello, thur," said the doctor, waving his hand in front of Patrick's face, "are you there?"

"Oh, yes, sorry. How is he, doctor?"

"Well, thur, motht of hith woundth are thuperfithial and I don't think there are any broken boenth, but we'll know better when we get him to Ecth-ray."

"Who's Ecth-ray?"

"He'th an imp he look at boneth through the fleth and thee if they're broken."

"He sounds very useful."  
"He'th indithpenthible," Igor confirmed, "what'th you friend'th name?"

"I don't know," Patrick had to admit.

"I don't think he doth either," said Igor, "he hath concuthion, and a thlight cathe of amnethia. We'll be keeping him in, at leatht overnight. Jutht ath a precauthion, you underthtand?"

"Yes, of course, doctor."

Patrick had stopped listening. Behind him he could hear the nurse, correction, love of his life talking to his new _friend_.

"Smite, can you hear me? It's me, Blister."

Patrick hadn't known much then about Omnian, naming conventions. He knew a great deal more about them now, and he still thought they were bonkers. The most beautiful creature in creation was called: Blister the Eyes of the Doubters with the Brilliance of thy Faith.

Of course he went back the next day to visit his _friend_ , who was insanely grateful. Omnians weren't used to the kindness of strangers, at least not ones who weren't fellow Omnians. Then again, who was? This made Patrick curious about his own small act of kindness. Luckily, though, Patrick's new _friend's_ girlfriend was grateful too. And Nurse Shame's best friend's friend was Nurse Blister.

So, when Smite was discharged they stayed in touch. Patrick had never wasted a moment's thought on wondering if it was right to simply use people just get what he wanted, so he had to qualms about using spite for his own selfish ends. And then, for almost untraceable reasons, he found he liked him.

It wasn't his straightforward honesty –though he did find that refreshing, when he discover it was genuine- or his courage, loyalty, sense of honour… all qualities he's never before encountered in anyone; it was his absolutely deadpan sense of humour. They'd been meeting up for weeks and Patrick was beginning to suspect that perhaps he didn't have a sense of humour at all. Then one night they were in Harga's, on their customary stools, and he'd asked him about his day.

"Well," said Smite, "Cheery Littlebottom was a bit short with me, again…"

Patrick looked, very closely, but there wasn't a flicker in the eyes, no hint of a raised eyebrow or flicker of a smile.

"And Igor keeps looking at me in a funny way."

Patrick had frowned at that blank look, and then Smite had winked at him, and he knew he had a mate.

And there was another thing: he'd thought Omnians were forbidden to drink alcohol.

"Oh, no," said Smite, "we're not forbidden; we just don't."

"Are you yanking my chain?!" exclaimed Patrick "Are you seriously telling me you're allowed to drink alcohol; you just choose not to?"  
"Yes."

"That's more insane than boiling people alive in a giant metal turtle!"

The very next night he had taken his friend to The Duck to introduce him to alcohol; at the far end of the bar.

"So, what'll it be?" asked Patrick, from his side of the bar.

"I have no idea," replied Smite, quite genuinely.

Patrick had to sympathise as he was at a bit of a loss himself. What on the Disc do you give someone for their first alcoholic drink?

"Right, baby steps. We'll start with a pint of ale."

"Oh, I couldn't drink a whole pint!" said Smite.

But that's exactly what he did, in one go. He smacked his lips, wiped his mouth and said:

"Well, that was nice, but I can't see what all the fuss is about."

"Oooookay, hmmm," Patrick sort of said, "well, that's just one variety…"

"Oh, there's another? Perhaps I should try that too. I'm very open-minded."

"Are you, indeed?" said Patrick, assuming Smite was just at it again.

Over the next three hours Smite opened his mind to seventeen different ales, –two of which he had to revisit- ranging in alcohol level from four to ten percent, without being either up nor down. On a couple of occasions he'd attracted spectators.

"I think," reflected Smite, " that I may prefer that wheaty Swartzbergsteinbeir, you know, the one from Überwald, or possibly the more hoppy Oo Aar Garmy's Old Riggwelter, which I think is from the Ramtops. Perhaps I should try them both again, just to make sure."

"Don't you feel drunk at all?"

"I don't know, what does that feel like?"

"If you did, you'd know. Ok, let's look at a different approach."

"You know me."

"No, actually, mate, I really don't think I do. Here, try this."

"What is it?"

"Vodka, from Blüdivostock."

" Well, that doesn't taste of anything," said Smite after knocking back a generous measure.

"True," Patrick conceded, "try this, it's whisky."

"Yeeuch, that's horrible!"

"Should you ever encounter a Nac mac Feegle do not, under any circumstances, repeat that. Any affect?"

"None that I can feel."

"Well, that would kind of be the definition, wouldn't it?"

Smite gave him a _look_ that made him laugh. The booze was clearly having some affect, however minimal.

"What about this?" he said, handing over a gin. Smite spat it out. "Ok, I'll give you that."

His opinions of other drinks were: brandy=better, rum=much better, scumble=now we're getting somewhere.

In the end there were only the two of them in the bar. Kate had cleared the pub and cleaned up around them. Patrick had broken up so many fights with breaking any bottles over anyone's heads that she figured she owed him at least a couple. He looked around the empty bar and decided he needed a drink himself. Patrick never, ever, ever, even once drank on duty, as his life might depend on it. Still, he thought he was probably safe with Lance-Constable Smite, because if he wasn't, then the whole concept of trust had no meaning.

He brought out a bottle of Chateau d'If 1789 from under the counter and showed it to Smite.

"What's that?" he asked.

"This, my friend," said Patrick, and paused for dramatic effect, "is wine." In spite of the delivery Smite appeared unimpressed, so Patrick continued:

"Made from the Merlittel grapes on the slopes of Bored-Oh in Genua and aged in oak casks for twenty years…"

"Sounds nice," conceded Smite.

 _Nice_?! thought Patrick, _Nice, is it? I'll give you Nice, my lad!_

This was a once in a lifetime experience and wasn't to be rushed. He uncorked the wine, smelled it to check the nothing tragic had happened, then took two glasses from under the bar. He warmed them over a candle and then poured wine into each and handed one to Smite.

"No, no," he said, as Smite made to gulp it the way he'd gulped everything else, "this is to be savoured. First you must inhale the aroma, or bouquet, as they say in Genua."

Smite dutifully smelled the wine as he'd been instructed.

"Oh, that's nice."

 _Nice!?_ again, _I'll Nice you, garcon!_

"Now, be careful," said Patrick, "hold it in your mouth and savour it, and remember that the second taste id the true taste."

Again Smite did as he was bidden and managed:

"Dad id di mode boodibble fing…" Before he keeled over backwards and was unconscious before he hit the floor.

Patrick rather assumed that the cause was the cumulative effect of enough booze to kill two men rather than one mouthful of wine, but you never knew. And, on the bright side, though he didn't like to drink on his own, he couldn't let the wine go to waste. That would simply be wrong. Smite had been teaching him about "right" and "wrong" and "good" and "evil". He hadn't quite got it yet, but he was trying. He raised his glass towards the prostrate Smite.

"Santé," he said.

 **Chapter 4**

Sergeant Boltmaker had warned him to be worried, but when Harry entered Commander Carrot's office, after knocking, he hadn't looked worried; he'd looked unhappy. And that was worrying. He'd never seen Carrot look unhappy before, in fact he'd rather assumed he wasn't capable of it.

"Is there something wrong, sir?" he asked, even though it was obvious there was.

"Yes, Harry," said Carrot, "I've let myself get distracted. I've let all this new responsibility, both professional and personal, take me too far from the streets."

"But that's my job, sir," said Harry, "mine and Stronginthearm's."

Captain Harbert Stronginthearm was head of the Night Watch as Harry was head of the day. Carrot had hired Harry even though he'd been sacked as Captain of The Watch in Sto Lat amid dark accusations of corruption and backhanders. It was rumoured that Harry wouldn't take any.

"Then you may have let yourselves get too far away too."

To an outsider this might have seemed like a mild rebuke; it wasn't, far from it.

"Are you talking about something specific, sir?"

Carrot didn't answer him, instead he said:

"We have a meeting with Lord Vetinari in an hour."

"Oh, dear," said Harry. When The Patrician wanted to see them, it was seldom good news.

"And the Duke of Ankh has paid me a visit."

"Oh, DEAR." It had been a long time since Sir Samuel Vimes had called round to his old nick on a social call, so this sounded like bad news, probably really bad news.

"And you're coming to dinner tonight."

"OH, DEAR!" This time he'd actually only thought it. He'd been for a meal once before with Mr. and Mrs. Ironfoundersson once before and whenever, in an unguarded moment, he recalled it, it still gave him indigestion.

It wasn't an order, of course, because Carrot never gave orders, he simply described the way things were going to be in the future and people did their best to make sure he was right.

"I have some things still to do," he said, and Harry could see that only iron control was keeping the exasperation from his voice. And then, only just.

"Make sure that Cheery and Igor know you're here and then get along to the palace and I'll meet you there."

He'd been dismissed.

All the way there Harry had tried to think of what it had been on the streets that had been so bad and yet that he'd somehow completely missed. There had been trouble the previous year with a lot of young trolls going berserk in public places, causing huge damage and resulting in several fatalities among dwarfs and humans. That had threatened to go really bad at one point.

Eventually he'd traced it to a new troll mob pushing bad _slab_ cut with _slate_. But he'd helped Chrysophrase sort that out. He'd even got a commendation from The Patrician –and the city a small, unexplained lava field just beyond the walls. That had been a much more pleasant trip than this one was likely to be.

Then a couple of months back there'd been that simmering dwarf feud that looked like it might boil over. That had started after than big influx of dwarfs from Copperhead a couple of years before that he'd never found out the reason for, and no dwarfs would discuss, not even Carrot. Anyway, that had eventually, and inevitably, come down to mineral-rights. He's sorted that out too. Of course he'd had to involve Carrot and eventually get Sir Samuel to ask the Low King to send an Arbiter of Dwarf Law, but it was all sorted out, and without bloodshed. Well, without much bloodshed. But with much muttering into beards and a great many grudges/mining-claims hatched, to be passed down from generation to generation.

As for humans, of course there was the usual level of rape, robbery and murder. Actually, most of the theft and killing was legally approved, and Guild-sanctioned. But there had been no reported rise in the background level of human evil. If anything it had fallen, in spite of the population looking as though it had actually grown.

And with the smaller minority races; he couldn't see how any of them could possibly be a problem. There had been a rumour a while back of a rogue vampire having claimed several victims, but either it was only a rumour or it had been taken care of without unnecessary fuss; either by the Black Ribboners or by the vampires on the Watch itself. Sally had been the pioneer, but there were now; and also: werewolves, golems, zombies, banshees, gargoyles, bogeymen, gnomes… The Watch genuinely was an equal-opportunities employer and he was proud of that. It was a shame that so few others had chosen to follow its example.

There had been another rumour of a new, even, smaller minority having arrived in the city. This seemed to be based on the mysterious, almost miraculous, disappearance of a number of cows from well-guarded stockyards and large quantities of whisky from secure warehouses. This had been put down to the arrival of some Nac Mac Feegle. He couldn't see this really being a BIG problem. In any case, if the Wee Free Men really had come to town, what was he, or anyone else supposed to do about it, stamp it out? He knew someone in Sto Lat who had once tried to stamp on a Nac Mac Feegle and nearly lost a leg. No, it wasn't any of them so, unless it was elves or orcs –and surely everyone would have known if it had been either of them- he was stumped.

Mostly the different races policed themselves: the dwarfs in accordance with Mining Law, the trolls according to Clan Dues and humans by the will of the Guilds. The Watch existed only around the edges, to protect communities from those within their ranks that they could not, or would not, protect themselves from. It had actually been Lord Vetinari himself who, in a quiet moment, had explained this to him:

"I rule the people and you police them because that is what they wish us to do. Should at any time they no longer wish us to do so, there is absolutely nothing either of us could do about it.

In the end he had to admit that he was completely flummoxed. He was already in trouble; he was soon to be in a great deal more, and he had no idea why. A policeman's lot is not a happy one.

He was standing in the ante-chamber outside The Patrician when Carrot arrived at precisely nine fifty-nine. He looked unhurried as he straightened his gleaming breastplate and removed his helmet. Harry didn't even have time to say "hello" before Drumknott opened the door and beckoned them inside, before disappearing.

Lord Vetinari was sitting at his desk, busying himself with some papers. Harry followed Carrot's lead as he advanced to within a couple of the desk and saluted. Vetinari didn't look up. There were two, comfortable-looking chairs just off to the side, but he didn't invite them to sit. Drumknott returned with a tray and poured The Patrician some tea. He continued to work while he let it cool. Eventually he put down his pen, picked up his cup and sat back, looking at them for the first time.

"I won't invite you to join me," he said, taking a sip and ramming the point of not inviting them to sit.

"I received a visit this morning," he began, in the tones of someone whose next words were likely to be: from your badly house-trained dog, "from a number of civic and community leaders."

It was clear that he could barely entertain the presence of the words in his mouth. Harry had to fight back the words that were trying to jump into his. Luckily, Carrot said them instead.

"I didn't know we had any civic and community leaders, my lord."

"Indeed," agreed Vetinari, "until today I was not aware of their existence either. I'm not sure I am now. It was a most…"he paused, "what was the word, Drumknott?"

" _Seedy_ , my lord?"

"Ha ha," laughed Vetinari, mirthlessly, "was that the word I used? No, in was a most, _unenlightening_ conversation."

"And what do they represent, exactly?" wondered Carrot.

"Well, the _civis_ , naturally: the city and/or its citizens. And of course the wider community, though I admit that that is a far vaguer concept; I have a list here."

He gestured to Drumknott, who handed him a piece of paper. The Patrician took it as if it were a rather soiled handkerchief, and looked it over.

"Ah, yes: _The Concerned Citizens Committee, The Residents' Council, The Local Businessmen's Association_ …it goes on," he said clearly tired of it, and handing it back to Drumknott, who handed it to Harry, who assumed he was supposed to keep it. "There are names on there too, perhaps you should look into them."

"Yes, my lord," said Carrot. "My lord, how did these _civic leaders_ become civic leaders?"

Harry thought trying to involve The Patrician of Ankh-Morpork in a discussion about the legitimacy of unelected leaders might possibly not be an entirely wise thing to do.

"To that, alas, I cannot speak. Another thing you might want to investigate. Oh, and one further thing, I have recently begun to see a strange graffito: a large, black "X". Do you know what it means?"

"No, my lord," said Carrot, "I don't."

"I think I do, my lord," Harry piped-up.

"Really," said Vetenari, "do tell."

"I've heard it's the ancient symbol of Ankh-Morpork," he said, feeling he was on safe ground, and there wasn't much of that here, "something to do with a line for each side of the city, and they cross at the river."

"Is that so," said Vetinari, "how charming. Then I shall detain you no further."

As they walked down the stairs he turned to Carrot.

"You both know what it means, don't you?"

"Yes."

"And it doesn't mean what I said, does it?"

"No."

"Then what does it mean?"

"Harry, if you really wanted to write something but you didn't know how to write, what would you do?"

Havelock Vetinari looked out of his window over the huge expanse of Ankh-Morpork. It was a terrifying site.

"There is evil out there," he mused.

"As always, my lord," said Drumknott.

"Thank you for reminding me of the obvious; such times remind me of how valuable you are."

"My honour is to serve, my lord."

Vetinari and Drumknott had been at school together, though Drumknott had been a scholarship boy. Their "master and servant" act was one that no one would ever see through; an Assassin's training could be useful in so many ways. When the pause had gone on for sufficiently long, Drumknott ventured something more:

"I have heard it said that for evil to triumph all that is required is that good men do nothing, my lord."

"Ah, would that that were the case," sighed Vetinari. He could see the unhappy figures of Carrot and Harry separate at the bridge.

"There go two good men who are going to do their best, and in both cases it is a very good best, yet it shall still not be enough."

"As you say, my lord," Drumknott agreed, "though perhaps if not quite such good men should also lend a hand.."

"Hmmm, interesting point. Which is my next meeting?"

"Madame Fifi, from the Guild of Seamstresses, my lord. Should I bring more tea?"

"No. Coffee, I think, one of the better roasts, and perhaps a decent cognac. Oh, and I'd like to meet Leonardo afterwards. I wonder what he's up to today."

"I shall attended to it immediately, my lord."

 **Chapter 5**

When, after a couple of weeks, and true to her word, Agnes came to visit she was appalled at how Moo was being mistreated.

"How can you starve her in this way?!" she demanded of Tiffany. It was a subject very close to her heart.

"I can't feed her any more than she'll eat," said Tiffany," and she eats more than Nanny."

"Round things," said Agnes who, however much she tried, was incapable of swearing.

Yet when they sat down to lunch she saw the truth of the words. There was a rabbit-pie and potatoes and carrots and peas. Agnes noticed that she ate almost half of everything and Moo ate most of the rest, while Tiffany ate virtually nothing. Though she then brought out a beef-pie, with parsnips and onions and cabbage, that all disappeared too, even though Tiffany ate very little and Agnes ate less than half. While Moo was doing the washing-up she apologised.

"I'm sorry that I misjudged you. She must be costing you a fortune."

Witches were very well rewarded for their services, especially the medical ones. People paid them in: food, drink, clothes, gardening, house-repairs… They even sometimes paid them in money, but only if they had nothing better to offer.

"It's just that she's so stick-thin."

"Hard to believe, isn't it?" Tiffany agreed.

"Where does she put it? She eats as much as I do and she's about the size of my arm."

"Gods, she's about the size of _my_ arm!"

"Do you want to lose the only friend you have?" scowled Agnes.

"Ok, sorry, it's just difficult to see how much food can go into something so tiny without it growing any larger."

Agnes had blamed her own size on everything from enormous bones to slothful metabolism, but the truth was she ate too much, and she ate too much because she loved food. She'd always rather be fat than hungry. But to be able to eat like Moo and still be thin… Oh, jealousy, thy name is Agnes.

From the kitchen, where the tiny thing had been washing-up, and in spite of their lowered voices, there came another voice. Grown much more confident in just a couple of weeks it said:

"It can hear you, you know?"

"Come in, Moo," said Tiffany, with a laugh.

And in she came. Still as skinny as a pipe-cleaner, but otherwise almost unrecognisable from the hopeless little girl in the playground. She was a picture in her pretty, red and white dress and matching cardy, set off by her long, ginger braids. Her big green eyes complemented her little, freckled face. But when she smiled it was like someone striking a match in a cave.

"Moo, how would you like a little trip out today?"

The smile ignited: "That would be lovely, miss."

She'd often wondered what the word _perky_ really meant, now she know

"We're going to visit Nanny Ogg."

She'd also often wondered what it meant when people said things like "her face fell". Now she knew that too.

One of the good things about flying by broomstick was that, if there were two of you, you didn't have to talk. If you were up front then you could turn round and talk to your passenger, but if you were pillion then the wind would snatch your words away faster than you could say them. Normally when they were flying Moo only held on to Tiffany lightly; this time she clung on so tightly it almost hurt. She could even feel the vibrations of Moo talking, though whether it was to Tiffany or simply to herself she couldn't tell. Probably just as well.

Agnes was waiting for them in front of Nanny's as they landed. When they entered the cottage Nanny was sitting in the farthest corner of the sitting-room, using the fire and a single candle to make herself appear all the more mysterious and sinister. Moo tried to hide behind Tiffany's skirts.

"Cackle, cackle!" said Nanny, but she wasn't joking.

"We've brought her here, just as you asked," said Tiffany.

"I didn't arsk," Nanny corrected.

The two young witches didn't know quite what to do with themselves, or even if they were supposed to be there. But with Nanny in this mood they weren't going to leave until they were told to.

"Come 'ere, child," commanded Nanny, from the corner. Moo, of course, did as she was told and Nanny Ogg leaned ominously out of the shadows.

Now, there was the Nanny Ogg that Lancre thought it knew: the jovial, old matriarch with the crab-apple face, colourful past and huge extended family. Of course there was another Nanny Ogg that terrified daughters-in-law (and now granddaughters-in-law) had come to know and tremble before. Who was sort of related. And then there was Gytha Ogg, the wytch in the gingerbread house, who wasn't related at all. It was this one who now spoke.

"What's your name, my pretty?"

Tiffany and Agnes both felt the hairs rise on the backs of their necks, but Moo now seemed completely unafraid.

"My name is Moonlight, Nanny."

They didn't know how long the simply waited while Nanny and Moo just looked at each other. It wasn't as though it was some wild staring contest; it was more like a conversation without the talking, but with lots of smiles. In the end Agnes got bored.

"Would you like a cup of tea?"

Tiffany shrugged. "Why not?"

As Nanny appeared to be in some sort of trance they decided to go to town with the cream and sugar – though Lancre wasn't a very big town- and raid the biscuit jar too.

"Do you think they're talking to each other in some way?" asked Agnes.

"Search me," said Tiffany, "though I can't imagine what else they might be doing. I wonder what sort of berries are in the this biscuit, they're lovely."

"Bilberries," said Agnes.

"How do you know?"

"Because I made them."

"Really? They're delicious. You never made any for me."

"Yes, I did," said Agnes, guiltily.

"Well, you never _gave_ any of them to me."

"Didn't I? Then I must have given them to the poor."

"The poor seem to eat a lot of biscuits around here."

"Never mind that, do you want one of these, they look great." Agnes held up a small, golden oblong covered in sugar.

"No thank you," said Tiffany, as Agnes took a bite of her biscuit and then froze.

"Oh, Gods, it's chocolate! It's a chocolate biscuit in Lancre. Chocolate, all the way from Howandaland. Tiff, you have got to taste this…" then she paused. "I don't believe it! You made chocolate biscuits, and you gave them to Nanny rather than me?!"

The wounds were obvious on Agnes' face, but they were also clearly cut into the deepest parts of her soul:

"You vile traitor, you darkest of enemies, you…"

"No, no, you don't understand," said a flustered Tiffany, "she's an old lady and I just thought…"

Just then Nanny and Moo emerged from their trances, which was just as well for everyone.

"Right you," she said to Moo, "you get yourself outside for a bit and we'll call you when we want you.

"And you can 'ave one of these biscuits with the funny stuff in it," she added, giving Moo one of Tiffany's _Chocolate Surprises_.

Agnes' eyes followed it out the door as Moo, as always, did as she was told.

"Get, me a drink!" demanded Nanny. "No, not tea, you daft girl," she shouted at Agnes.

"Yes, ale'll do to start with," she said as Tiffany handed her a jug, from which she took a huge swig and then seemed to settle down.

"Now here's what I know, my chicks, and it's not much.

"Something's narsty's brewing. It's something that's always been about, it's just more of it. But there's another thing, and it's a thing like what Him said: it's growing and getting worse, like a sickness. But it's also like a thing, a big bad thing, and it's gonna get bigger and badder, and worser and worser. And I don't know how or why but I think the only way to stop it is our little Moo."

"What!?" exclaimed Agnes and Tiffany, almost simultaneously.

"Oh, come on, girls," laughed Nanny, "that little scrap of skin is more witch than the three of us together. And we're three good uns."

It was no more than confirmation of what Tiffany almost knew anyway. And if Nanny and Tiffany were that convinced, then Agnes wasn't going to gainsay them.

"So, what is this _thing_?" asked Tiffany.

"Sorry, dearie," said Nanny, "that's beyond my powers, but I know I won't be around to see it, if that's any help."

"Can you tell exactly when?" asked Agnes.

"No, love, it's against the rules, but we can't see that clear anyway, you know that. Now awful long, but not real soon either. Is that any help?"

"A bit, Nanny, thanks," said Tiffany.

"Now, can I see that little spark of ginger hair again? She fairly cheered me up, and I'm normally a miserable old baggage. And don't you two go agreeing neither," she laughed as they both began to nod.

Tiffany went and called Moo back in and Nanny asked her over to sit on her knee. This time it was the Nanny who was little more than a one-toothed grin in the centre of a lot of wrinkles, so Moo went. Though Tiffany suspected that she'd have gone anyway. Once she was settled on her knee Nanny began:

"Let me tell you about the time Little Aggie went to be a singer in the Opry in the Big City…"

"Oh, Gods," said Agnes, slapping her head while Tiffany giggled.

"Would you like a biscuit, my pet?"

"Yes, please, Nanny," said Moo, "could I have one of the ones with the bilberries in them?"

Agnes had a little smile to herself.

"Course you can, my chick. And then I'll tell you about Little Tiff and the Wee Free Men."

"Oh, no…" moaned Tiffany.

 **Chapter 6**

After her morning nap Angua had played with Ire for a while until, by arrangement, one of the Interchangeable Emmas had arrived to take her to the hall for one night. The children both loved staying with Sir Samuel and Lady Sybil. Wolfie because he could play with Little Sam; and Ironhammer because all the Emmas made such a fuss over her. Ire seemed to be one of the few people who could tell them apart. She supposed it was a bit like the way Sally could not only distinguish between different Igor, but also ask after the health of related Igors, and the health and whereabouts of their related body-parts. Perhaps that was an ethnic minority thing.

Being from one herself, Angua was very sensitive to how minority races were perceived and valued. Dwarfs had been a problem from the beginning. Any race that quaffs a lot of beer, lusts after gold, appears to have no women and eats rats is always likely to have an image problem. Especially when it is as short of temper as it is of stature and doesn't bother with concealed carry. Yet now they were not only accepted but valued, because they could make any thing, from weapons to houses, out of anything: stone, wood, iron…gold, better than anyone else. They never tried to cheat you; never went back on their word… And if you ever tried to do any of those things to them; you never got the opportunity to do it twice.

Trolls were accepted, simply because there was nothing else you could do with them. Enough dwarfs could bring down a troll and even kill it, but they would do so only in battle, never sneakily in a back street. Humans simply didn't have the discipline, or the courage. Also while humans and dwarfs might have over-lapping desires on occasion, especially when it came to gold, trolls simply didn't want the same things. Sure, dwarfs might want phosphoric acid for the purposes of etching metal, and humans to throw in someone's face, but neither wanted to drink it, at least not more than once. And not in the quantities trolls did.

As for the Minor Minorities; they were mostly too small to be worth bothering about, for anyone. When she'd first _come out_ there had been a few wolf-whistles and howls, and combinations of both. Then one day in Sator Square a pack of young men did it once too often. She had favoured them with a snarl. A full, head-transforming , burning-eyed, maw full of slavering fangs snarl. People hadn't known that she could do that at will, if she chose to.

There were a lot of people there to see it, but that was as nothing compared to the number of people who claimed to have been there to see it. She never received as much as a vaguely anti-Lupine comment after that, Nor did any other werewolf – or even anyone whose eyebrows met in the middle. She knew because they kept in touch using, of all things, the twilight howl. Some things are just bred in the fur and nothing to be done.

It was different for vampires, of course, it always was, no skulking around alleys looking for bone and trying to avoid dogs for them. There it was. Her best friend in the world; the best friend she'd ever had; the friend that she trusted not only with her own life but with the lives of her children…was a vampire. The very word made her carnassials ache. She hated vampires.

There, she'd said it, if only to herself. Well, not all of them, of course not: Otto Chriek, Or Prince Vladimir Nicolai Jozef Illyich-Davidovich Ulyanov-Romanoff Vossarionovich – aka Vlad- who worked the rooves on the Nightwatch. Or Lucy –aka Donna Lucrezia la Gioconda di Magenta i Solferino; a soul so tortured by her past that, as punishment, she had chosen to work in an abbatoir and live in the cellar where its waste drained into the Ankh. Until Sally had found her and persuaded her that good works were better than mere penance. Now she worked at Bernie's in the day, at the Sisters of Kindness in the evening and then through the night as a cleaner at Morpork Mercy.

She'd had Lucy round a couple of times for tea with Sally and all she could remember about her was: her shyness, almost childlike prettiness, skeletally-thin frame, paper-white skin, raven-black hair, giant, almost purple, eyes, incredibly long eyelashes…and bone-crushingly strong handshake. But that was the way with vampires: what you saw was never what you got.

Most people never met a vampire, at least not outside of Überwald, but then most people never went to the Opera or to society balls. Even Otto couldn't attended a murder-scene in The Shades in anything less than white-tie, tails and a cape. For every hard-working flatfoot like Vlad, or pathetic, wretched penitent like Lucy –asking forgiveness of gods she didn't even believe in- there were a hundred sociopaths moving graciously and effortlessly around the city's most fashionable salons..

She could almost hear herself and how she would sound: Oh, I don't mind gargoyles; remember what it was like with them pigeons before they arrived? We could do with a few more of them if you ask me, and they're so quiet, you never hear a peep out of them. But vampires , well…

When some vampires had moved out of the ballrooms and into the streets, to earn an honest, and modest, bite, _The Post_ had briefly tried to whip up a "bloodsuckers in our midst" panic with one of its typically vicious campaigns. However, when the scions of a number of ancient and noted Überwald families –including the Lady Margalotta and Sally's mum- had explained to Lord Bothermore that _polite society_ could, if pushed, become really rather impolite, the tone changed. Suddenly it was "They don't want a pint from you; they want to take you for a pint."

But what could she do? It wasn't thought it was pelt. And it was made all the worse for her being able to hear Sally preparing dinner in the kitchen downstairs. With two naps under her pelt and and the prospect of a lovely, child-free evening and a delicious meal ahead, she suddenly felt a wonderful rush of mischievous girlishness that she had felt since…well, ever.

She concentrated, closed her glands and suppressed her scent. Then she slowed her heartbeat to less than one a minute and took a breath deep enough to last five. Only then did she slide out of bed.

Initially she thought she should only walked on her toes, but then decided that that put too much strain on her calves, that might require a heartbeat, or even a breath. Instead she tried a trick that she's picked up from Sally. She's noticed that her friend could walk across a dry floor in wet feet and leave barely a mark. She'd practised and practised and know she could more or less do it. Of course when Sally did it it looked both graceful and effortless. Angua didn't care how she looked but she knew this walk required no effort, and least physically, mentally it was a different that didn't matter. It was as close to perfect as she was capable of.

For thirty seconds she's carried a fly on her hand while the fly had moved less than the hand. Her only worry had been that there might be a creaky floorboard that could give her away. But, no, she'd reached the bottom of the stairs and all she could hear was Sally chopping. A few more steps and she'd actually be able to see her.

"Please tell me you are not trying to creep-up on me, "said Sally without turning round.

"Awww! How did you know!?"

"Where would you like me to start: the deep breath? The slowed heart? The cautious toe on the floor?"

"How can you possibly know that?!" Angua demanded.

"I'm a vampire," said Sally, "I'm sorry, dd I forget to mention that? And put some clothes on; we evil bloodsuckers prefer our victims to be wearing a nice nighty. It's like garnish on your steak, or something."

"Clothes shmoes," said Angua, "I'm not the only one seen prowling the streets naked when decent folk ought to be in bed."

Sally went on chopping vegetables, a rare sight in Angua's house, but a welcome one.

"Sally…" continued Angua from the doorway.

"Yes, Angie." Grrr! Sally knew she hated that.

"You know how you said earlier that you once didn't sleep for two years," shallow breaths, shallow breaths, "well, was that really true?"

"Have I ever lied to you?"

"No so far as I'm aware. Why didn't you sleep for two years?"

"I was busy."

"What could you possibly be doing that kept you so busy you couldn't sleep for two years?!"

"Oh, you know how hard it is for us to sleep. Can't find the right coffin. Find the right coffin, but can't find the right soil. Find the right coffin and the right soil, and the crypt's too draughty…"

"Doesn't sound like enough, what else were you doing?"

"Oh, the usual: terrifying virgins, sucking blood, ravishing virgin –though only ones in nice nighties- that sort of thing. You'd be amazed how it eats into your schedule…"

"SALLY?"

"I was in love! There, satisfied?"

Angua was not merely, not satisfied, she was dumbfounded, at least for a while. And that was probably just as well. Anything she might have said would likely have been: pointless, stupid, hurtful, or all three, or worse. Vampire's didn't fall in love. They often passed on their genes by methods other than fang but only, like all nobility, only for reasons of advancing their family interests. Never for something as tawdry and plebeian as love. It would have been unspeakably vulgar and would have been shunned by all the very worst people. Once Angua had had a long enough pause she knew she had to speak.

"You've never said anything about this to me before," she offered quietly, not sure quite what tone to adopt.

"No, I haven't, have I?" said Sally.

"I'm sorry, I just wondered if you wanted to talk about it now."

"No, I bloody-well don't!" snapped Sally, " and don't you even dare try to make a joke out of that."

"Ok, but you're my best friend…"

"And you're my only friend."

"And you're mine. Will you ever want to tell me?"

"I promise to tell you everything before I die."

Angua wasn't as easily fooled as most marks though.

"Do you promise to tell me before I die?"

"Yes, that too. It's almost as though you don't trust me," accused Sally.

"With my life," said Angua "but not to tell me everything about yours… Let's leave that for another time and some…vine! What are you making?"

"Soup," said Sally, "and I shall have some more…vine, thank you." She drained her glass and handed it over.

"What sort of soup?" asked Angua, refilling Sally's glass and handing it back.

"Just vegetable?"

"No, no, vegetable and cheese."

Angua wasn't always sure when Sally was messing with her so she decided to play along.

"And what is the main course?"

"Fish, and more vegetables."

"And vegetables for pudding?"

"Oh, no. For dessert there is fruit and cream and eggs."

"Right, thank you, I get it, you're making a meal. It's like asking a dwarf about his bricks and mortar when he's building a house. I shall leave you to your art while I go for walkies."

"Ang, I'm sorry," said Sally, relenting, "you just stirred-up some emotions, and you know that's hard forme."

"I know, Sal."

"I'll tell you soon, I promise; when I know myself."

"I'm friends if you are." Sally nodded. "So are the vegetables, fish, cheese, fruit, eggs and cream just going to be boiled-up together in one pot? That's what Carrot would do."

"I haven't decided yet; I'm still creating."

"In that case I shall go and make myself even more beautiful than I already am."

With that she swept out of the room, which isn't easy with no clothes on, but easier if you have a built-in animal grace.

"Well, it's a lot of hair to brush," called Sally, just as she reached the bottom of the staircase. Angua smiled; they were definitely still best-friends. So she nipped back down.

"Is there any chance that you might give up two more years to help me take care of the children; so that I can get some?"

Sally tossed her hair: "Sleep never bothered me anyway."

 **Chapter 7**

Gods know why, but for some reason Patrick felt duty bound to accompany Smite to a Thursday service at the Queer Street Church of the Great Om (Reformed). He thought it was only fair. If Smite was prepared to try to understand his ways, against all advice to the contrary, then the least he could do was reciprocate. That he also hoped Bliss might be there was entirely co-incidental. Oh, come on, he couldn't fantasise about someone called Blister.

Indeed there she was on the other side of the aisle, in her pretty white-cotton dress and see-through veil. Now there were some mad religions on the Disc –well, madd-er at least- and Patrick thought that up on Dunmanifestin they played with people for their sport. It was as though there was a competition to see who could come up with the daftest idea that people would still be prepared to follow. Mass-Lam the Contradictory decreed that all women should be swathed entirely in black at all times so that they could hardly see, and barely walk –it was called _veiling_. Otherwise, apparently, Mass-Lamite men would be compelled to rape them. At the other end of the scale were the followers of Mazohn, the god of small businessmen. Mazohnites were compelled to wear little aprons and only one sock, which wasn't too much of an imposition, except on every other Tuesday, when they also had to walk around blindfold too.

By these standards Om was almost off the scale. For centuries had Omnians been smiting unbelievers with a vim and vigour that other gods could only envy. And by gods could they smite. Burnings, beheadings, flayings… they would smite anyone with anything. Including the jawbone of an ass, or the thighbone of a bullock, if nothing else was available. And that was just in their own back knacker's yard. Anyone who so much as misinterpreted or even missed out a word in reciting the Verses of the Prophet Eleidedh, would be smote, or boiled in oil, or nailed to a tree… Eventually it became clear, even to the Omnians, that they were starting to run out of Omnians to smite. So they had built a huge and terrifyingly disciplined army, and taken smiting on tour.

But all that was before the Reformation of Brutha, when all was changed, changed utterly. Now all that Omnians –or at least most of them- ever visited upon anyone was compassion, generosity and remarkably advanced medical knowledge. Oh, and sometimes some improving, enlightening and politely-worded pamphlets. And this bloody veil.

Patrick just didn't get it. He didn't get the Mass-Lamites either but at least he could see what they were trying to do. I woman swathed in so much black cloth that it was impossible to work out her shape –or even if there's anyone in there at all- is not going to be attractive to anyone, which might account for why Mass-Lamism was in such sharp decline. But this veil didn't make even that kind of sense. It was worn only by unmarried women and was intended to indicate both their modesty and their chastity. But a little piece of gauze worn across the bridge of the nose hides nothing and only draws attention to your eyes, and Omnians had beautiful eyes. It didn't make them look modest nor chaste either, though it did make them look incredibly sexy.

He was fairly sure that in church one was supposed to be concentrating on The Great Om and the words of the preacher, not thinking of the beautiful young women opposite; at least not in the way he was. And then there was the preacher himself. He'd never before been harangued with quite such vehemence to go forth and be charitable and kind. When he had to address those who hurt them, or who slighted Om his eyes bulged and his face turned purple.

"You must FORGIVE the TRANSGRESSORS!" he yelled.

Even with all of his assassin's training Patrick felt his own face beginning to purple as he fought back the laughter. Beside him the gentleman nodded, while across the hall the ladies clapped politely in their white-lace gloves. And then there was the singing.

He's never heard anything quite like it. The whole congregation, from the youngest to the oldest, seemed to have beautiful voices and be able to sing in perfect harmony. When the preacher had asked at one point for volunteers for the choir he'd assumed he was joking. Until he'd listened to the choir. They were as close to divine as anything he had ever heard, or could imagine hearing. He would happily have gone there every single day just to listen to it. If only it hadn't been for the words.

The problem with Omnian hymns, at least the ones everyone knew, was that most of them had been written before The Reformation of Brutha. This meant they were mostly about boiling people alive, hacking off their limbs or chucking them on fires. Rather than, following the new fashion: giving them your help, your love and indeed everything you owned. He'd tried it a couple of times, but beautiful people singing beautifully about mass-slaughter was more than his discordance muscle could lift. Still, that was as nothing compared to his first date with Blister.

He'd thought that a double-date, with Smite and Shame at the most expensive, Genuan restaurant in the city –La Petite Folie- would have been suitably low-key, but that had been Richard thinking, and times had changed. On the other hand, he'd thought, it would have been a good test.

The first thing he'd done once he'd escaped was to get his face done, well, the second, obviously. The first thing he'd done was make sure he was still rich. There were many things that he'd been reluctant to take from his father: beatings, advice, a name… but money had never been one of them. Of course he'd been far too clever to leave any of the money - that was supposedly his- in a bank where someone else could, for whatever reason, block his access to it. No, he'd slowly and surely removed it from all his accounts and put it in a big box in a big hole in the ground. It was all back in banks now, of course, but not under any name that could ever be traced back to him. Whoever _he_ was.

The next problem that he'd encountered with his face was the obvious one: what did he want to look like? For the right price a good Igor could make you look like anyone you wanted, but it was best to have some idea going in. However, Patrick had been in an understandable hurry and just said something like "averagely handsome" before going under the knife. It might have been an idea for him to have looked at the pictures on the wall of Igor's _satisfied customers_. When the bandages had come off and all the bruising had finally faded he looked like a matinee-star in in one of those moving pictures that people still seemed to want to watch for some reason. On the other hand, there were a couple of advantages: no one could mistake him for Richard Ravenswood any longer; and now even Bliss might not think she was out of his league. But that was another thing; Bliss didn't even seem to realise she was beautiful. Of course if you're born in Omnia then you grow up surrounded by beautiful people, and when everyone is beautiful then _beauty_ loses all meaning. But Bliss had been born in Ankh-Morpork, as had Smite and Shame, yet none of them seemed to notice that they were now also surrounded by ugly people, like Gorgon the Greaser –who made the best fish and chips in the city- and Nobby Nobbs and, well, Patrick himself, a bit, before his transformation.

Then there had been the problem of trying to explain the concepts of: date, dinner-date, double-date and that he was paying for the whole thing. It had taken so long that he'd been tempted to give up on the whole idea. But Blister had indeed seared her image onto his retina, and Omnians never gave-in to temptation, so why should he?

Smite had had to ask him what they should all wear to a fancy restaurant. He'd told him they should wear their Thursday clothes, but without the veils. That had been tough, but he doubted he could cope with watching Bliss eat food under her gauze.

Of course no one would be able to recognise him now, he was sure, but he was still slightly nervous and thought the best additional disguise would be to have three other people with him who were even more attractive than he was.

At first he'd considered doing the whole carriage thing, but ended up just meeting Smite at the YMOA and then picking up the girls at the Nurses' Home. Also, his first thought of going up-market with The Splurge had been scaled back, then further scaled back and then scaled back again. Even so, his companions thought it luxurious and everyone else in Le Marché appeared to think the four of them had wandered in by mistake.

In that way that he was coming to find increasingly unsurprising, these three people, who were normally almost exclusively vegetarian, had taken to seafood soup, with all the creatures still identifiable in it, and raw beef with an egg cracked over it, as though it was just something you had to get on with. That they had then found these things utterly delicious seemed to astound them.

He'd never met people like them. They weren't like children. Sure, they all seemed to have a child's sense of wonder at each new experience. But there was none of the fussiness or fear, or petulance, or attention-seeking… There was just, genuinely, something deeply _wrong_ with them.

The conversation had been one of the most _interesting_ he'd had in his life. It began with the wine. It became clear early-on that Smite's reaction to his first mouthful of wine had indeed just been the tipping-point. Now, without the run-up of nineteen pints of ale and several large measures of assorted strong spirits, he loved the stuff, and really appreciated it too, and liked to talk about it in the most flowery language.

However, he and Smite were essentially having a conversation with each other while the girls would barely look up. Patrick was sitting beside Bliss and opposite shame as this was, apparently, the Omnian way.

"Would you like some wine?" he asked her.

"No thank you, sir," she said, without looking up.

"It's not forbidden, you know?" he offered, helpfully.

"I know, sir," she replied and favoured like with a flash of huge, beautiful, brown eyes.

"Did not Brutha himself drink of wine?" asked Smite.

"Actually, no, he didn't," said Shame, matter-of-factly.

"But he could have if he had wanted to," said Blister, "so I shall."

Patrick poured her a large glass. From his limited study of Omnian drinking habits, he doubted that a small one would suffice. She took a deep breath and then, as they all watched, had a mouthful.

"Oh!" she said.

There was a moment's silence while they waited for further information, then Blister took another, larger drink.

"Ooooh!" she exclaimed, "Shame, you really must try this."

"Ok," said Shame.

Patrick simultaneously slapped his forehead and gestured to the sommelier with his other hand while Smite poured her a glass. She took to it like a honey-badger to fighting.

There is nothing like good food and wine to loosen tongues and enliven evenings. Soon Bliss was sitting across from Patrick and Shame across from Smite, and the girls were now prepared to actually look them in the eye. And gods, what eyes! They were enormous, of course. Bliss's eyes were particularly enormous, but Shame's eyes were enormous too, and even Smite's were pretty big, and very brown. Well he supposed that Bliss's were technically hazel; and he wondered if he might not be becoming obsessed.

Of course there had been the, almost inevitable theological discussion about the pros and cons of alcoholic drinks.

Then suddenly they'd started talking about sex. And in the most explicit terms.

"Shhhh!" he demanded.

"Why?" asked Shame, a picture of innocence.

"Because other people can hear," he hissed.

"Why would they be interested?" asked Blister. Were they, conceivably, really that innocent? Patrick wondered.

"In Genua it is considered impolite to speak of sexual matters in public."

Both girls looked absolutely stricken that they might have committed a faux pas. For his part, Patrick didn't really want to discourage them.

"It's alright, no one has noticed. Just do it quietly."

They both nodded and, in lowered voices, continued:

"Did not the prophet Ebidiah say: _It is sinful for woman to be wonton_?" whispered shame.

"No," said Blister, "he said: _It is sinful for a woman to be left wanting._ "

"Oh," said Shame as if this was news to her, "so a woman must be satisfied, according to the prophet."

"Of course," Bliss affirmed, "as must men. All things must be equal under Om. As Brutha explained…"

Patrick was completely fascinated; Smite looked as though he'd been petrified. Who'd have thought that theology could be quite so enthralling?

"In that case," suggested Shame, "would it not be sensible for a woman to test relations with more than one man before making a final decision?"

Patrick felt his eyes grow wider, as his eyebrows crept farther up his forehead.

"Or experiment with another woman," Blister suggested.

His eyebrows shot up into his hairline, tipped over his chair and landed him on his back. Where he'd called for the bill.

They'd walked the girls back to the Nurses' Home, where they both thanked Patrick for a wonderful evening, and he had asked with all his oily, Assassin's faux-gallantry, if he might kiss their hands. They each removed one lacy glove and blushed when his lips brushed their bare skin. Confusing observation number…oh, he'd lost count hours ago. Then he dropped a still-dazed Smite back at the YMOA, before heading back to The Duck.

The pub was closed but Kate was still up and he decided to join her for a nightcap. As he sat down at the bar she handed him a cognac.

"I'd have settled for a brandy," he said.

"I'm being Genuan," she replied.

"Was that a clever play on words?"

"Of course it was. So, how was your evening?"

"Kate, if I told you. You wouldn't believe me."

"The fact that you can say that with a straight face means you don't know me very well."

"Ok, I'm in love."

"I don't believe you."

"With a beautiful Omnian girl…"

"I don't believe in Om."

"…who thinks she should experiment with several men before she marries, or possibly a woman."

"I don't believe in her."

"You know, Kate, I'm not sure I do either."

Patrick had no idea of how old Kate was, and wasn't even prepared to guess. She wasn't old, as any unruly customer who had recently felt her right-hook would attest, but she was no longer in her first bloom. She'd told him once that she had in her youth been a noted singer and dancer, and had done the latter while not wearing very much.

"Were you wearing less at the end of the song than at the beginning?"

"Of course, I know how to sell a performance."

He'd seen her beat men twice her size in arm-wrestling contests, and up to three men at once in bare-fist fights. Apparently she'd also been in the army and worked down the docks –though as a docker rather than a seamstress. However, she made it very clear that she had nothing against being a seamstress as it was "a tough job in a hard world".

Of course there was a difference between a courtesan trained at the Guild of Seamstresses and a poor wretch selling herself down the docks. Materially it was the difference between a duke and a destitute drunk. Morally, as a certain Sir Samuel Vimes would confirm, it was no difference at all. And if there _was_ a difference it wasn't in the way you might think.

"You know," said Kate, "I once rescued a child from a burning building all on my. But I slash on neck, and what name do I get?"

If Kate didn't believe something, Patrick concluded, it was literally unbelievable, and therefore not real. He went to sleep that night safe in the knowledge that Bliss had been simply a dream.

 **Chapter 8**

As the weeks went on Tiffany began to wonder more and more about the little girl she had taken under her roof. It was simply beyond her understanding why someone hadn't already adopted this child. Yes, she ate a lot; a scarcely believable amount –though that was slowing down a bit- without ever putting on any weight, but that was surely because she was never still. Actually, she was, when she knew she was supposed to be, like at the table or when they were out visiting. And she could be motionless for ages while looking at a butterfly that had landed on her arm. But Tiffany could see the effort she had to put in to sitting still. It would have exhausted a lesser person. No, the only time she was truly still was when she was asleep, and when she slept , she did it so profoundly that when Tiffany had gone in to check on her one night, early on, she'd thought she was dead.

Everything she did she seemed to be able to do just more so. She didn't climb trees like a bot; she climbed them like a monkey; -and there weren't many people in Lancre that even knew what a monkey was- she ran like a hare and swam like a fish. The tiny hands on the ends of her skinny arms had a grip like a vice. And she took in knowledge with even mare relish that she took in bacon sandwiches. And, unlike with food, she never got full, ever.

Tiffany knew a little about a lot, and a lot about a little. Fortunately she also owned some books, as did Agnes, and Queen Magrat owned tons. And that was just as well because Moo never forgot anything. As far as she could guess, she might to teach Moo for another couple of years and that would be it. She'd have to start teaching her magic soon or start learning from her instead. Because she suspected that Moo might have been _borrowing._

It wasn't something that Tiffany didn't do often, partly because of the effort required to get inside the head of another creature, but also the fear that she might never get back. Moo, however, seemed to literally be able to do it in her sleep. A lot of mornings Moo would tell Tiffany about her _dreams_ , but the vividness with which she described: being in the forest at night, swimming under the water in the river or flying over the Ramtops made Tiffany fairly sure she's actually been there.

And there was another thing. It had been Agnes who had first mentioned it to her, but it was actually something she herself had noticed at their first meal together: Moo rang every last drop of pleasure out of absolutely everything she did. The girl rejoiced in running for no purpose other than doing so until her legs would no longer hold her up. And yet she could sit frozen for minutes on end just so she could examine the bugs that landed on her.

But what was most astonishing, at least for Tiffany and Agnes, was her relationship with other children. Nanny made them see it by getting Moo round for a birthday party. Nanny's extended-family was so huge that almost every other day was likely to be someone's birthday. The Oggs were a prolific clan, so now it wasn't just Nanny's grand-children, but also her great-grand-children who were blowing out their candles. At first Moo had just stood at the side of the room, in her bunches and her party-frock, looking awkward. Then one of Nanny's great-granddaughters, Esme, had come up to her, asked her name and then taken her hand and said they should get some cake. For the next three hours they'd watched her dance and play and eat sweetmeats with the other children; for all the Disc as though she was just a little, nine-year-old girl.

"She's an odd one, isn't she?" observed Agnes.

"You have no idea."

When they got home Tiffany had asked if she'd enjoy herself:

"It was the best time ever, miss."

Once again Tiffany didn't doubt her, because Moo never told a lie. In fact Moo never did anything wrong. At first Tiffany had wondered if it was because she was terrified she'd be thrown out if she did. So she'd asked her.

"Yes, miss," said Moo, ever honest.

"You think I might throw you out of the house if you're naughty!?" cried Tiffany, appalled.

"No, miss. But I think I should be a good girl, just in case."

That was Moo for you; she couldn't even lie about being devious. And then she made a friend.

Tiffany wasn't sure, but she thought that perhaps the last time Moo had had a friend; she hadn't been walking and talking all that long. So, if she was going to have a new friend then the absolute worstest would be Margs.

Margs was another of Nanny's great-granddaughters and a trial to everyone who knew her. Apart from Nanny, of course, for whom no relation, younger than one of her own children, could possibly do any wrong. Not even Margs.

Margs and Moo were about the same age and about the same frame, for about the same reason, that's where the similarity ended. Whereas Moo could make herself sit still if she really had to, Margs would have to be tied down, or nailed.

All the bad-girl things had spent her whole life being falsely accused of, and unjustly beaten for, Margs actually did. Agnes had once told Tiffany, though she wasn't sure how seriously, that she'd seen Margs standing at a wedding while her stockings spontaneously laddered and her plaits un-braided themselves before her eyes. She wasn't a boy in girls' clothing; she was a wild-animal in a torn dress.

And yet she got away with it, more often than not, because of her face. No one was prepared to believe that that face perfect and beautiful innocence, sparkling with that utterly guileless smile, could possibly be responsible for: the broken vase; the little boy with the black-eye; the dead fish in the fire… Margs could look guiltless standing over a decapitated corpse with a hatchet in her hand.

They'd first met at one of the innumerable Ogg birthday parties and become friends at once. No one could have planned it better, though both Tiffany and Agnes suspected that Nanny had done precisely that.

Tiffany was more than happy. Of course she was worried, more or less all the time, as any parent –or anyone in a parent's place- would be, because Moo would go off for whole days with Margs and come back in scratches and bruises and sometimes cuts that were actually bleeding. But she'd clean the wounds on both of them; heal a bit, if necessary; feed them –Margs had a huge appetite, though not to be compared with Moo's- and send them on their way.

She did wonder what they got up to, sometimes, but she never asked Moo. Moo would simply have told her. On the other hand, she did once think of asking Margs, because she liked a good fantastical story now and then.

Once again it had been Nanny who had urged them on with the age thing. Moo wasn't sure how old she was and didn't know when her birthday was, so Nanny had decided that the should choose a birthday for her. They'd started to think about it.

"Twenty-second of Doon," Nanny announced.

"Mid-Year's Day," Agnes wondered.

"And why not?"

"It's a very important date, though," said Tiffany.

"So it is, my lovelies, so it is," agreed Nanny.

And so the Lovely Day was agreed between all three of them. And it was further agreed that her birthday party should be held at Nanny's cottage.

"Do you ever wonder," asked Agnes, as they went to fetch their brooms, "if we'll ever be consulted on these _unanimous_ decisions?"

"Oh, I'm sure she'll tell us if we will," said Tiffany.

When Agnes came into sight of the cottage she was appalled at the sight of her friend sitting on the grass, in the sunshine, wearing nothing but her nightdress. She was plaiting flowers.

"Tiffany Aching!" barked Agnes, in her best scolding voice.

"Oh, morning, Aggie," said Tiffany, throwing her a huge, beaming smile. Agnes felt a little lift in her stomach and had to fight back a smile of her own.

"What if it had been someone else and they'd seen you like this?" she demanded, not giving up so easily.

"Oh, I'd have heard them," laughed Tiffany, "just as I heard you when you turned into the lane and climbed over the stile."

"You did NOT know it was me."

"Well, it's true," Tiffany conceded, "that there may be more than one person who wears _Midnight Musk_ , has a pebble in the heel of one of her shoes and says _botheration_ when she bangs her knee on the post, but the odds were definitely in my favour."

"Which heel?" demanded Agnes.

"The left," said Tiffany

"Ha! Wrong!"

"Well, it's a long way, and what with all these woodland sounds…"

Agnes did a quick check, as she sometimes got them mixed up, but it was definitely the right, so there!"

"Would you like a cup of tea?" asked Tiffany, getting up, "I have some chocolate biscuits, freshly made."

But of course Agnes had smelt them baking long before Tiffany had heard the pebble in her shoe.

"Well, only if you think I'm good enough," Agnes goaded.

Tiffany laughed again and it was as light and lovely as hearing leaves being rustled by a Summer breeze. It was a rare sound, but one of Agnes's favourites.

"Why don't you take your boots off?" asked Tiffany, heading indoors, "I'd forgotten how nice it was to feel the grass between my toes."

And so they sat in the sunshine and had tea and biscuits and made coronets out of flowers like the two little girls they had been not such an awfully long time before. But after a while Agnes felt she had to ask:

"Where's Moo?"

"I have no idea; off somewhere with Margs."

"Aren't you worried about her?"

"Not in the least."

"You know, you are one of the worst liars I have ever met?"

"At least I'm better than you."

This was undeniable. Agnes would blush whenever she told the tiniest of fibs. In fact, she would get so nervous about the prospect that she would sometimes fumble the words to such an extent that what came out was hardly a lie at all. At least not one that anyone would be able to recognise.

"At least I'm better than Moo."

"And bees are better at making honey than fish are," laughed Tiffany, and Agnes laughed along. For all they knew Moo might have been great at lying, it was just was just one of those things –like speaking Klatchian- that she'd simply never tried.

"How long have they been gone?"

"Since breakfast."

"What time was breakfast?"

"Dawn."

"So, they've been gone since about four o'clock this morning. What time is it now?"

"Just gone half-past ten."

"And when will they be back?"

"When they're cold, or hungry."

"And when do you think that will be?"

"Well, given all the early fruit that's around, Margs's general scavenging skills and the warmness of the nights: it could be a couple of weeks.

Agnes looked Tiffany straight in the eye, but if she was lying then she was doing it far better than she normally did.

"Are you joking!?"

"Well, maybe not weeks, but certainly days."

"Have they stayed out all night before?"

"Oh, yes, several times."

Agnes could hardly believe her ears. "And then what?"

"And then they come back with bruises and scratches and tales of wonderful adventures."

"You let Moo go and stay out all night, in the wild, having adventures!? With Margs, of all people!?"

"Margs isn't a bad girl."

"No," Agnes had to agree, "but she's a naughty girl."

"So is Moo."

"Oh, don't be ridiculous!"

"No, honestly. Yes, she always does as she's told. Tell her not to do something and she won't do it. Tell her not to repeat something she's done and she won't do it ever again. But she's too clever not to have worked out that some of the things she hasn't been told not to do are very similar to things she _has_ been told not to do. She's not sly; she's not devious; she's just…naughty. How else would you want her?"

"But Tiff, she's with Margs, they could be anywhere; it could be dangerous!"

"I'm sure it is. Often I don't ask."

"You can't be serious! You mean you're not interested?"

"Oh, I'm always interested; I'm always brimming over with curiosity, but sometimes I think it's just better that I don't know."

"I can't understand what you're saying!"

"Look," said Tiffany "two weeks ago they came back from wherever they'd been with Margs having to hold Moo up, as her legs were like jelly, she couldn't talk a word of sense, her eyes were all over the place and she had a lump the size of a duck's egg on her forehead.

"We bathed her together and put her to bed. Then we both stayed up all that night. Margs wouldn't leave her bedside, even when she was fast asleep on her stool. The next day Moo was a bit better and Margs kept trying to tell me what had happened, but I wouldn't let her. You know Margs, it would just have been a pack of lies anyway. I only let her tell stories when Moo's with her, because as soon as she starts inventing, Moo starts frowning and she stops.

"Anyway, by the second day Moo had recovered and they both wanted to tell me what had happened; and I forbade it. I told them it must be their secret and that they should tell no one else."

"What!?" said Agnes, incredulously, "why in the name of all the gods would you do that?"

"Because it was probably something stupidly dangerous, and I would have forbidden them to do it, or anything like it ever again. And Moo would have obeyed me, and thereby probably ruined the rest of her childhood. Margs of course would have completely ignored me and, no doubt, done the self-same thing again, but on her own. And because then there would have been friend around to help her and take care of her, she'd probably have died."

"Well, it's a case," admitted Agnes, "though not a very convincing one. Has anyone ever told you that you think too much?"

"Everyone I've ever met, apart from you."

"Well, you can include me too now," Agnes said.

Tiffany laughed again, but this time it wasn't quite the little-girl laugh anymore.

"Right," she said, getting up, "they're on their way, so I'd better change while you finish of the coronets."

"Can you really hear them?," asked Agnes, straining her ears and pulling her shoes and stockings towards her.

"Oh, yes," said Tiffany, "but they're a good fifteen minutes away. And I wouldn't bother with the shoes; a witch should be able to feel the earth beneath her feet."

"Well, as long as I've got my pointy-hat on."

"Oh, don't be silly. Didn't Granny ever tell you? That's just for in front of men."

The girls duly turned up about a quarter of an hour later. Their faces, legs and arms were tanned, bruised and scratched. Their feet were filthy and the only semblance of order about the appearance of either of them was the fiercely tight braid hanging down each of their backs. However, in the laps of each of their torn dresses they carried a good collection of what the people of Lancre called _greeners_ , the small, sweet delicious plum that grew wild for a month every Summer. Agnes clapped in delight at the sight of them. The girls, of course. Of course, the girls. But those plums really were sweet.

Tiffany appeared at the door, all in black and with her previously flowing hair looking as if it had been nailed to her head; but no hat and still nothing on her feet. She was carrying a plate for cold meats and another of cheeses. These farmers could be so generous sometimes.

"Agnes, would you get the bread, and girls, wash your hands before we have lunch.

And so they passed a pleasant hour or so, eating and drinking things made or picked within an hour's walk of where they sat, and talked of all the things that that happened within an hour's walk of where they sat. The story of the girls' day was told, mostly by Margs, and mostly accurately, thanks to Moo. The girls drank water with a little elderflower cordial in it, while the witches drank something that that nice young farmer Giles made from elderberries.

At the end of lunch there really wasn't much to clear up so Tiffany suggested that they girls go for a nap as they both looked totally exhausted, and off they trooped.

"Are you drunks?" she asked Agnes.

"Oooh, yesss. Do you think an'body noticed?"

"Well, I didn't," Tiffany assured her, "but I can't feel my toes. Can you feel my toes?"

"I don't know, where are they? What did you give me to drink, you wicked witch?"

"Oh, there are my toes; they're on ends of my feets."

"Tiff, what did we drink?!" laughed Agnes.

"Dunno, thought was eld'berry wine; bit of water, where's the harm?"

"Can you see stars?"

"S'noon-ish, can see stars for the Sun."

"I can see stars, and tweety-birds, and…dwarfs!"

Somewhere in her addled brain Tiffany found a grip and decided to get it, so she gripped Agnes:

"Aggies, magick!"

Agnes nodded, they held each other's hand and pulled and whatever it was that had been messing with their minds was yanked out, almost painfully.

"Wow," said Agnes, "pretty good stuff."

"Indeed," agreed Tiffany, "I think I may have to have a word with farmer Giles of Ham.

 **Chapter 9**

Harry's day had gone from baddest, to worser to toilets in a very short time, even before he met Mr. Trilby. It was bad that Commander Carrot thought he was crap at his job, it was worse that The Patrician thought he was crap at his job too. But it was really shit that he thought he was crap at his job as well.

Of course he had to rely on his sergeants and constables for a lot of information, but he still pounded his beat each night. Just like he'd done every night since he'd arrived in the city; because he didn't need much sleep. As it turned out he'd just been in the wrong places.

His beat had always been The Shades, right from the start, mostly because nobody else wanted it. He knew what was going on, he knew the players –such as they were- and he knew the victims; because that was almost everyone. But that was why he didn't know this. People in The Shades were so busy just trying to survive that they didn't pay much attention to how other people were striving to do the same. But as soon as he stepped outside that all changed. It was as though everyone knew what was going, except him.

Though he knew most of these people, he didn't know what they were telling him, because what they were telling him didn't make any sense. No one denied that Omnians were generally despised, or that their houses and shops were being vandalised, or even that they were often being attacked in the streets. But apparently this was "all their own fault". It seemed that they would work far more hours than normal people; even though they were incredibly lazy. And they pushed out proper shops because they undercut them; by overcharging everyone…and on and on.

Even Bert, for gods' sakes, the ground's own pepper:

"I keep myself to myself, Mr. Mudd, as you know, but that's what I hears."

Bert was working the small piece of garden behind his small house, where he grew a small amount to supplement his small income.

"Bert, would you just listen to what you've said?" pleaded Harry.

"Oh, I know it sounds daft," said Bert, "but that's what I hears."

"And what if you heard that someone could grow vegetables by not planting them and pouring bleach into his soil."

"I'd say he was an Omnian," said Bert, with an arched eyebrow and a wry smile.

"Oh, Bert," sighed Harry, "even you?"

"All I wants is a quiet life, Mr. Mudd, I don't bother nobody."

"Actually, Bert, you're really starting to bother me."

And then he had had a meeting with Nigel Trilby.

Mr. Trilby was the leader of the Small-businessmen's Association. He was a neat, little man with a toothbrush moustache and thinning hair that he was trying to disguise with a comb-over. Harry wasn't sure but he suspected Mr. Trilby was quite a bit younger than he appeared.

"Ah, Captain Mudd, "he said, getting up from behind his desk and offering his hand, "so good of you to come."

Harry shook his hand, which was slightly damp.

"Do have a chair," Nigel went on, "would you like some tea?"

"No, thank you, sir," said Harry, "I'd prefer to get down to business."

"Quite so, quite so," said Trilby, "well I'm gratified that Lord Vetinari appears to be taking our concerns seriously."

"So it would appear," agreed Harry, "what precisely are your concerns?"

"Well, all that we in the SA are looking for is a level-playing field…"

"And you feel that the playing-field is not level, I take it."

"Indeed," said Mr. Trilby, "and, to be frank, it's all down to Omnian immigrants."

"Is it? And how exactly do they make the playing-field uneven?"

"Well, frankly, by undercutting."

"So, they charge less than your members?"

"No, not as such."  
"Then in what way are they undercutting you?"

"Well, now I'm not saying they're dishonest, but it's not really the same product they're selling."

Harry seemed to remember that this was called _apophasis_ in Ephebe: saying that you're not going to say something, and then saying it.

"Let me see if I understand you," said Harry "are saying that Omnians charge the same for a particular product as your members, but that their product is just better?"

"Well, I wouldn't put it like that, quite frankly."

No, Harry thought, because you're probably one of the least frank people I've ever met.

"May I ask what your business is, ?"

"I hardly see how that's relevant."

"Indulge me."

"I'm a meat importer."

"Hmm. Omnians don't really eat meat, so I'm fairly sure they don't import much of it."

"Oh, naturally I'm not concerned for myself."

"Naturally."

"But the SA has many members…"

"Such as?"

"My friend Mr. Seemly."

"Who's a wine-seller, and Omnians don't drink."

"Or Mr. Carpenter…"

"What! The world's worst joiner?"

"I sorry, Captain, but I don't really think I like your tone. It is the duty of The Watch to stand-up for the rights of the decent, hard-working people who were born here."

"Is it now?"

"Yes, it is!"

"Well, a great many of these so-called Omnians were actually born here."

"That has nothing to do with it, as well you know."

"Actually, I don't think it does either, but I really don't like _your_ tone, Mr. Trilby, and I now have an overpowering urge to wash my hand. Good day"

So here he was now, sitting in The Duck drinking whisky in the day to try to get the taste out of his mouth. If there was anyone he was angrier with than himself it was Sergeant Visit. Deepdelver and Detritus barely noticed what humans did, but that wasn't their job. Sergeant Cuttler was human but, for various reasons, wasn't competent by virtue of being on the edge of insanity. Visit was Omnian and was obviously aware of what was happening, so why hadn't he told Harry. Mind you, now that he thought about it, he remembered a report Vlad had made to him that he hadn't really paid much attention to. Perhaps Visit had just assumed he'd be ignored. He was probably right.

The Day Watch wasn't the ideal place for a vampire but Prince Vladimir Nicolas Josef Illyich Vossarianovich Romanoff-Ulyanov liked a challenge, and was good at keeping to the shadows. Also, he didn't really sleep, so he often did the nightshift as well. Like all the other vampires who were off _the red stuff_ when he did try to sleep, it was troubled. Young women, especially in Überwald, often had nightmares of a dark, demonic presence invading their bedrooms to ravish them and bite them and drain them of their blood. In his bad dreams he was that presence.

Still, it could be worse; at least he wasn't Lucy. He's first met her in Schwarzbergstadt about a hundred years before and had been utterly captivated. The contrast between her tiny, almost childlike, body, her sweet, beautiful, innocent face; and those wild fiery eyes and cruel smile had quite taken his breath away. Or it would have done, if he'd breathed.

It was difficult to see any part of La Donna Lucrezia di Magenta i Solferino in the pathetic wretch that he saw now, and he did see her quite a bit. Of course they were bound to bump into each other at the butcher's shop and at the hospital, but he'd also sometimes walk her _home_ from The Sisters of Kindness when things we slow.

Lucy didn't actually have a home. She worked at the shop, then the hospital, then at the Omnian home for the destitute and then went back to the shop. Bernie paid her well and fed her for free and the hospital paid her too, but she was totally penniless. She either gave all her money to The Sisters of Kindness or had it stolen. She was constantly being robbed. Various muggers had discovered that she always carried all her money with her and, and that when they attacked her she never fought back. At first Vlad had thought of reporting it to the Thieves Guild, but then he'd joined The Watch instead.

It was remarkable how easily people could be dissuaded from attacking a frail, helpless girl just by a huge, terrifying, dark shape descending on them and breaking some of their bones. No one seemed prepared to stick in at their jobs these days, he thought, young people just lacked a proper work-ethic.

Eventually Lucy had consented to use his room to at least change her clothes –vampires never needed to wash- and keep some money in a jar there. Though gods' knew what she might ever spend it on. The hospital provided her with a nurse's uniform; Bernie supplied a smock and an apron for work. Other than that she seemed to own one small, white dress that she wore to the hostel and –as far as he could see- nothing else, not even shoes.

Whenever Vlad walked with her she always looked as if she'd just been crying, or was on the verge of tears; that's when she wasn't actually weeping. Yet at the butcher's she was always laughing with the customers. At the hospital she was always cheery, though concerned, and at the hostel, always smiling and sympathetic. He'd actually tried to broach the subject with her once:

"Luzy, you cannot keep punizhing yourzelf forever, you know?"

"Yes, I can!"

It had been said with such total finality that he saw no point in arguing about it, though that's when he'd decided to talk to Sally about her.

Of course the main reason for his wanting to talk to Sally about Lucy was that he wanted Sally. One of the benefits of being a vampire was that –though you might lie about everything to everyone else in the world- you never lied to yourself.

He remembered very clearly the first time he had seen Sally. It had been at a Grande Balle at the Autumn Palace in Üpyrgrad. In the Great Hall, amid a swirling sea of beauties she had managed to stand out as a crest among the waves. He had a feeling that Lucy had been there too. And he remembered his father's hand upon his shoulder.

"Zhe iz not for you, my zon."

"Why not? Zhe iz the ze mozt beautiful girl I have ever zeen."

"Her family iz of inverior ztock, and wampirez never marry for loff."

At the time it hadn't seem to matter as Sally only had eyes for Harry. To the obvious disapproval of both sets of parents, and against not only all precedent but any semblance of uncommon decency, they appeared to be totally, and hopelessly, in _loff_.

And now they weren't. He had no idea that might have happened between them down the decades, but now they barely spoke to each other. And that was why he was on the temple roof with her now. He'd flown most of the way and then misted down on to the parapet to walk the last few yards towards her totally silently.

"Well done, Vlad," said Sally, "no one else can ever get that close."

"I vaz not trying to creep up you."

"Of course not; I prefer a vegetarian diet myself."

"Ah, it iz zo refrezhing to commune viz zee dark zpiritz. Vat are vee doink up here?"

"That!" said Sally, pointing down into the street.

A large ugly crowd carrying flames was mustering on the edge of Egitto, the largely Omnian enclave shouting very ugly things. And they were clearly in a very ugly mood.

"Vlad, I'm on duty and in uniform, would you do me a huge favour and…"

"Oh, you vill not owe me one for zis. I cannot remember ze lazt time I had an angry mob vit torches to play vis."

He leapt off the tower and Sally watched him land gently a few yards in front of the mob. She had a lot of other things to do but decided to hang around for a bit a watch Vlad work the crowd.

Any nasty bunch of bullies will always enjoy encountering a lone opponent and it started jeering at him as soon as it saw him. Though it seemed surprised that he didn't immediately run away, it just made it angrier. And then he reached out to their minds. He wasn't expecting much, but what he found surprised him.

To anyone who watching, and who wasn't part of the crowd –even to Sally- he didn't appear to be doing anything. But to his audience it was a terrifying performance. First his eyes began to glow like hot coals, then smoke started to swirl out of his body; then the smoke turned jet-black and became giant wings while Vlad himself grew fifteen feet taller as his skin began to burn with a fierce blue flame. By the time he opened his six-foot wide mouth to let them gape down his volcanic throat, they were already on the run.

"Bravo," said Sally, clapping her hands as he joined her back on the roof, "you certainly haven't lost the old magic."

Vlad, smiled and swept off a bow, but Sally could see that something was bothering him.

"Is there a problem, Sergeant Romanoff-Ulyanov?"

"Vell, Sergeant von Humpeding , zat voss not ze uzhual crowd."

"In what way?" asked Sally, becoming suddenly curious.

"No mind," said Vlad.

"Well, that's hardly unusual, all mobs are mindless, aren't they? No longer individuals but…"

"I do not mean zat," he interrupted, "zis vos not a hive-mind, it vos no mind vhotzoever; az zo zhey did not even know vot zhey ver doing."

"That's what they all say."

"No, really, it vos az zo zomzin vos controlling zhem and ven it zensed me it dizappeared."

"Maybe it just didn't like you," laughed Sally.

"And I very much did not like it eizher," he said, flatly, and watched the smile die on her face.

Harry rubbed his eyes, because he thought they must hurt from all that not looking.

"I haven't seen you here at this time before, Captain Mudd," said Kate, "are you having a bad day?"

"I couldn't begin to explain."

"Oh you'd be surprised at what you can explain to me," said Kate, leaning across the bar and wiggling her boobs. Harry had to smile.

"My wife doesn't understand me," he laughed, without humour.

"Really, is she foreign?" said Kate, pouting.

Now he really did laugh, and he didn't realise he still had that in him:

"No, just female; almost as incomprehensible."

"Sure she isn't just Omnian?"

It was as though the nine whiskies he'd just had were suddenly sucked from his body.

"You know about this!?" he asked, incredulously.

"Of course, everybody does," said Kate, with a disbelieving face.

"I didn't."

"Really, Harry, are you sure about that?" she asked, tilting her head to let him know that she already knew the answer.

"Bad cop?" he asked, plaintively.

"And then some," she affirmed. He hung his head in shame.

"And now I have to go round to Commander Carrot's house," he said morosely, "and this time what's waiting for me is even worse than the food."

"Before you do that I'd have a word with my head barman, if I were you."

"Patrick? Why?"

"Well, his girlfriend's an Omnian and so is his best mate, and his best mate's girlfriend…"

"Ok, I get the idea," said Harry, "what time does he come in?"

"Oh, he won't be long," said Kate, "why don't you have another nine whiskies while you're waiting?" Even Patrick's friend Smite couldn't compete with Captain Mudd when it came to consuming huge amounts of alcohol without ever showing signs of becoming even slightly tipsy.

"Sure where's the harm?"

 **Chapter 10**

It wasn't as if he'd never met a girl's parents before. Patrick had known a lot of young women over the years; known them really quite well. He wasn't particularly handsome –well, he was now, but he didn't used to be- yet there was something about the rakish danger of an assassin, or perhaps all that black silk and velvet, or maybe just that _je ne sais quoi_ that comes with titled wealth… Whatever it was, a great many well brought-up young ladies had wanted him to persuade them to do the sort of things that well brought-up young ladies didn't do.

Of course he had obliged; it would have been ungentlemanly not to. And as he had generally met these girls at society balls, he had often been introduced to the mother and father of one of his persuadees; who never seemed to object to what he was obviously up to.

But that had been all about social position and being _polite_ in _Polite Society_. This was the first time he had ever been invited back to _meet_ someone's parents. And this time he was going to have to actually be polite.

He's asked Bliss what he should bring.

"Oh, bring wine," she'd said.

"Your parents drink wine!?" he'd asked, incredulously.

"Well, not yet."

"What about flowers for your mum?"

"For Om's sake, no! Unless you want to be thrown out of the house."

It turned out that Omnians loved flowers: planting them, growing them, tending them, pruning them…the idea of cutting them down in their prime to give to a woman so that she might watch their corpses rot for a few days struck them as bonkers; and they knew a lot about bonkers. He decided not to commit the atrocity of the blooms but instead to buy a couple of good bottles from Seemly's.

The Shivarananoms lived in the Egitto, or Omnian quarter, just the other side of Sticken Place from The Shades, as most Omnians did. As he walked down its streets he thought they were the neatest and cleanest he'd ever seen, admittedly he'd just come from The Shades, which can bias a man, but these streets stood up well against any of the posh ones around Hide Park. And they scored over those upmarket streets in two ways: they were overflowing with flower-pots and flower-baskets, but also children were playing in them.

Bliss's parents, and her younger sisters and brother, lived above their tailor's shop. When he rang the bell the door was opened almost immediately by Bliss herself, as though she'd been waiting behind it. She was wearing a pretty little dress and a little gauze veil, just to make an awkward evening even more difficult.

"Good afternoon, sir," she said, curtseying, "it is lovely to see you. Would you like to come up to the parlour?"

Patrick thought it was more than just lovely to see Bliss again as he followed her up the stairs. In the parlour stood two beautiful young people, presumably Bliss's brother and sister, and he wondered where her parents were.

"This is my father," Bliss began, "Destroy the Infidel's Arguments with Superior Logic."

"Good evening, sir," said Patrick –who didn't miss a beat- shaking his hand with a firm grip, that was reciprocated.

"And my mother, Confound the Heathen with Random Acts of Kindness."

"Enchanted to meet you, ma'am" he said, kissing her hand. Bliss's mum giggled.

Was this a setup? Was this some elaborate joke intended to either test him or just make him look foolish? There was no way these people could be old enough to have a child of Bliss's age –though now that he looked again, she seemed a lot younger than before- they barely looked old enough to have children at all. And then he looked again.

His assassin's training was useful in so many ways and one of the lessons was: observation may be the difference between life and death; look carefully. He could now see the tiny lines around their eyes and the edges of their mouths, but it was in the depths of the eyes that the tale was really told. These were people who'd had it hard, but were damned if they were going to admit it.

"I have brought a small gift," Patrick continued, holding out the bottles, "I trust that that's in order." He was almost embarrassed by his own formality, but this was a new experience for him.

"Ah, wine!" said Mr. Shivaranaom, "Blister has told us much about it, thank you." He moved his eyes in the direction of his wife and Patrick understood that he should offer them to her.

"Thank you, young man," she said, taking the bottles and flashing him a smile that made him see where Bliss got her looks, and her eyes.

"Now," said Bliss's dad, "while the women prepare the table, you and I shall get better acquainted."

Bliss and her mum duly departed with the wine to prepare the vegetarian meal, yeeeuch! Mr. Shivarananom laid a strong hand on his shoulder and guided him towards the window.

"I wondered if we might have a quiet word before dinner, ."

"Of course, sir."

"Oh, you may call me Destroy."

"And I am Patrick sir."

"Well, Patrick, it seems you want to have sex with my daughter."

This place, this small few inches of floor, this was where dumb was originally founded.

" ," was all that Patrick could manage.

"Well, you do, don't you?"

Another important lesson he'd learned at The Guild was: never give a straight answer to a straight question. On this occasion he decided: what the hells?

"Yes, sir."

"Good, can't have children without having sex."

"So I understand."

"You'll have to be married , of course."

"Of course," Patrick agreed, "would I have to convert to Omism?"

"I don't know. What are you now?"

"Eh, nothing."

"In that case I don't think so."

"Oh, good."

Now his prospective father-in-law became more serious and looked at him with narrowed eyes.

"A word of warning, Patrick," he said, gripping Patrick's arm hard, "if you should in any way mistreat Blister, Om will be avenged upon you."

"Destroy, trust me, if anyone should ever harm your daughter, Om will be the least of their problems."

"Excellent," he said, "let's have dinner."

For dinner they were joined by Bliss's younger brother Harangue and her two little sisters: Mortify and Disgrace. He was sort of getting used to Omnian names, but that didn't make them any less mad. All three of them looked very young which made him start to worry about just how old Bliss was. He'd assumed she was a bit younger than him, maybe twenty, but Harangue looked about ten and the girls were younger still. It would be a big gap and something he was going to have to ask Bliss about, and soon. Right after dinner in fact.

It was a dinner he wasn't looking forward to, but not because of the company. Patrick had eaten vegetables before, of course, and was actually partial to potatoes, peas and even carrots in the right place. And the right place was is a rich lamb stew, or sitting beside bacon and sausage or a thick juicy steak. Mostly, though, vegetables brought back memories of the amorphous, boiled slurry that he used to get slopped on to his plate at boarding school, to go with the boiled meat. A meal consisting solely of vegetables hardly bore thinking about, so what he got confused the hells out of him.

Firstly, he couldn't identify most of it: aubergine, okra, artichoke…it was all new to him, but the tastes were astonishing and there were crunchy bits and spicy bits and creamy bits and… It was, quite simply, the most delicious meal he'd ever eaten, and he said so. It made Mrs Shivarananom laugh, that same lovely, light thing that Bliss had.

"Oh, Blister said you would flatter me."

"Honestly, Confound, I have never tasted anything better and I've eaten a lot of great meals."

"Why, thank you, young man," she said, laughing again.

And that was another incongruous thing: Patrick was twenty-three and he didn't think Mrs. Shivarananom looked that much older. Even Destroy only looked to be in his early thirties; certainly not old enough to have a daughter of Bliss's age, whatever that was. It was all terribly confusing and needed sorting out, right quick.

The wine had been a great success too; even the children had liked it. Patrick knew he should no longer be surprised that teetotallers thought nothing of giving alcohol to preteens. The Great Om certainly knew how to mess with people's heads. And then after dinner there had been coffee and a delightful little Omnian herbal drink called _chernobil_. Though it turned out actually to be made from a root.

The coffee was superb: so thick he could have chewed it and served in the traditional Omnian fashion: black as night, sweet as honey and hot as hell. But that was as nothing beside the _digestif_. Destroy brought out two glasses only -clearly this was man's stuff- and began the ritual. First he poured a generous measure of _chernobil_ into each glass. Patrick smelt it immediately, and if there was no alcohol in that then he was a cave-painting. Next he took a spoonful of sugar, immersed it in the liquid and balanced it on the glass. When both glasses were ready, and while a kettle was boiling, he set fire to the sugar. After letting it burn for a few seconds he put out the flames by pouring a little boiling water over them; he then stirred the sugar into the mixture and handed one to Patrick. Patrick almost felt drunk on the ritual alone, but not as drunk as on the fumes. It didn't even smell like booze; it smelt like narcotic and it tasted that way too: sweet and bitter and intoxicating. It was little wonder it was hard to get Smite drunk if he was used to drinking this stuff.

"It is made from the roots in the Worm Wood," Destroy explained.

"Is it indeed?" said Patrick, making a mental note never to go there. He took a sip, and then soon discovered that his glass was empty. Destroy made to prepare another, but he politely refused.

"Actually, people seldom have a second," said Destroy.

" _Pas de merde!"_ thought Patrick. He could see immediately that there was no such thing as two glasses of _chernobil_ ; there was one, and then there was dead in a ditch.

The conversation had been wonderful all evening. Everyone had been animated and witty, even the children had been delightful company so perhaps that, combined with the _chernobil_ was what caused him to commit his _faux pas_.

"Have, you had any trouble around here, Mr. Shivarananom?"

"Trouble?" asked Destroy.

"You know, with Omniphobia."

"I'm sure I don't know what you mean," said Destroy, suddenly stiff.

"You, know, like what happened to our friend Smite…" Patrick glanced around the table; everyone looked stricken. He didn't know what he'd said but he knew he shouldn't have said it. His training kicked-in immediately.

"Oh, nothing," he said, dismissively, "I've having so much fun, but I fear it's getting late; perhaps I should walk your daughter home."

Everyone seemed to relax; there were even some nervous giggles.

"A fine idea," laughed Destroy, convivially, slapping him on the arm.

Everyone laughed along and began hurriedly clearing the table.

"Now, remember, ," Destroy went on, "Blister is under your protection, and you have my trust."

A lot of people had trusted Patrick in the past; Mr. Shivarananom was the first one who wasn't wrong to do so.

He had two questions, and he didn't know which he wanted answered more, but he knew which he wanted answered more urgently. They had only been walking for two or three minutes when he turned to her and asked:

"Bliss, how old are you?"

"Ha ha, is that what you call me?"

"Well, it's nicer than Blister."

"Oh, I don't know, it seems a bit _girly_ to me."

"Bliss, you are the girliest girl I have ever met, and also the prettiest, I refuse to call you after a skin irritation."

"Why, thank you, kind sir," she said, combining a smile and a blush to great effect.

"So, how old _are_ you?"

"I'm eighteen." Phew! "Why do you ask?"

"Oh, it's just that Confound seems a bit young to be your mother and…"

"Oh, Confound is my second mum; my birth-mum died when I was little."

"Oh, I'm sorry."

"Don't worry, I hardly remember her and Confound has been very kind to me."

"So the children are…?"

"My half-siblings."

Well, thankfully things were becoming much clearer.

"Just out of curiosity, how old _is_ Confound?"

"She's twenty-eight; Harangue is ten, Mortify is eight and Disgrace is six. And father is thirty-six."

"I think I see a pattern emerging."

"We believe that people should start to have children as soon as they're old enough: while they're still young, healthy and fertile."

The last part was clearly the nurse in her coming out, he thought.

"I just have one more question."

"I shall answer truthfully, as always."

"Why did everyone get upset when I talked about Smite?"

The smile of Bliss's face disappeared and her shoulders slumped.

"We don't like to talk about such things."

"Why not?"

"Please don't ask me that, Patrick, please," she pleaded, taking his hand. Her hand was small and soft and warm –his own was large and calloused; much coarsened from working in The Duck- he squeezed it gently.

"Ok, I won't ask again," he said, and was rewarded with a smile.

They walked the rest of the way holding hands and talking about inconsequential things. When they reached the entrance to the Nurses' Home Patrick made to kiss her hand, but instead Bliss lifted her veil raised her face and pouted. He kissed her gently on the lips and then suddenly she threw her arms around his neck and kissed him back, with more passion than he'd ever been kissed before. When their mouths came apart he was amazed at how fast his heart was beating. Bliss looked at him with her big, beautiful, brown eyes; then she laughed, turned round and skipped away. Women! He thought. Can't imagine a world without them; can't understand a thing that's going on inside their heads. Especially an Omnian woman's head.

For Patrick, what Omnians thought about everything was pretty weird, but what they thought about sex was weird even for a religion. As with virtually all cultures on The Disc, and indeed all animal species, the guarantee of paternity was hugely important. And so the Book of Om insisted "that certain acts are purely unto thy spouse, on to the begetting of children and not before thy wedding night". As far as he could remember that was pretty much what they all said. The difference with the Omnians though, since the Reformation of Brutha, was that everything else was pretty much alright, with anyone, anytime. But that was a game he wasn't intending to play. Not this time.

It had been a very pleasant evening in so many ways, he thought, as he made his way back to The Duck, but he'd be damned if he wasn't going to find out what secret these Omnians were keeping from him. He would keep his word and not ask Bliss about it again, or her family. But he hadn't said anything about not asking Smite.

 **Chapter 11**

Tiffany wanted Moo's party to be special, and that meant the best elderberry wine and elderflower cordial in the whole of the Ramtops. But before that, given Agnes and hers recent experience, she needed to have strong words with farmer Giles.

"I'm very sorry, miss," said Young Giles, "there must have been a bit of a muddle."

"I'm not sure what you mean by _muddle_ ," said Tiffany, wearing Frown #2. Frown Number One was reserved solely for badly behaved children, while the frown-level went all the way up to ten. The most anyone around these parts had ever seen was a six, and he would "really rather not talk about it."

"Well, miss, you see, well, it's like well…"

Tiffany just stayed still. It was another one of her tricks. She could not move in any way in a way that made statues look twitchy.

"…what I means is, it must have been berries from the top of the North Field," Giles spluttered.

"And how would this make a difference?" she asked. She had also been working on her voices. This was barely a four, and they went all the way up to a hundred.

"Well, well, now well…" blabbered Giles.

"Stop blabbering," commanded Tiffany, dropping to a three, to give the poor man a chance.

"Well, you see, miss, that's where Granny and Nanny and Her Majesty used to go a-covening of a dark and stormy night and ever since, well, them berries has been a bit _peculiar_ , if you knows what I mean."

"But you still make wine out of them," she said, sternly.

"Only for export, miss, only for export," Giles frantically tried to defend himself, " _North Field_ is very popular in Ankh-Morpork. And even farther afield, if you can believe such a thing."

After her one experience of even watered-down _North Field_ Tiffany could certainly believe it might be popular with the young and foolish in Forn Parts.

"Then why did I get a bottle of it?" she wanted to know.

"Well, you see, well, it's my old dad, you see? He gets a bit muddled sometimes, what with one thing and another…"

Young Giles himself was over seventy, so she could see how his _old dad_ could easily have wandered off into the land of confusion.

"Never mind," said Tiffany, "no harm done." Well, -ish, she thought. "Can I count on there being no _muddle_ for the party at Nanny's?"

"Absolutely," said Giles, eyes wild.

She supposed that Old Giles might dismiss even her as being no more than chit of a girl but, however muddled his mind might have become, there was no way it wanted to be on the wrong side of Nanny Ogg.

She'd been thinking more and more about Moo, for a couple of reasons. First off, she was everything that parents always said they wanted in a child. She was polite and obedient at all times. She did her chores diligently; so diligently in fact that Tiffany had had to rein her in and explain that the chores were supposed to be shared. Moo had seemed a trifle surprised by this and when she'd thought about it she'd realised she'd been being a bit lazy of late.

And therein lay a slight problem: Moo was so transparently honest all the time that there was a danger she could find out things about herself that she'd really rather not have known. Like how she was very careful of how much she ate and critical of others who weren't.

"You always smile when you're watching me eating, miss," Moo had said one evening over dinner.

"That's because I love the way you enjoy your food, darling," she'd replied.

"But Miss Agnes enjoys her food, and you don't smile when you watch her."

Was this really why it had taken so long for anyone to take Moo in: that she couldn't help herself saying what was in her head and always told the truth? Tiffany suspected it might be and sent a note to herself from her inner teacher: must do better. The second reason was down to an incident that had occurred a few weeks before.

She'd been asked by Mrs. Hedge to attend the lying-in of her eldest daughter as she herself had been forbidden to by her daughter's husband. She'd seen right away that mother and baby weren't both going to survive. In fact she'd come out of the bedroom almost immediately and explained to the husband that the baby was probably already dead and that all it was doing was killing his wife. It wasn't Tiffany's decision to make, but neither he, nor his wife, were prepared to make it, until the time for doing things was long past. So, she'd been sitting there by the bed alone –the husband having fled into the night, she knew not where- feeling utterly exhausted, while she waited for the undertaker.

"Good morning, my lord," she'd said to the cold wind she suddenly felt.

GOOD MORNING, MISS ACHING.

All witches eventually became well acquainted with this tall, dark opposite-of-a-stranger, so she thought she'd take advantage of their familiarity.

"May I ask you a question, sir?"

YOU MAY, THOUGH I DO NOT GUARANTEE YOU AN ANSWER.

"You spoke recently to Nanny Ogg of a Great Evil that was abroad; is Moonlight here to fight that evil?"

YES, SHE IS.

"And can she defeat that evil?"

THAT, ALAS, I CANNOT SAY.

This then was the conflict she now felt: on the one hand she was afraid for the little girl she was beginning to love like a daughter, but on the other; if something needed doing then, apart from the Hooded Gentleman himself, there was no one on the Disc more reliable than Moo.

When the day came Agnes was round early for breakfast. There was a choice: yoghurt with seasonal fruits or porridge with honey. Agnes wasn't pleased, and she was no slouch in the frowning department either.

"You have heard of bacon, haven't you?" she asked, coldly.

"Oh, that's for Winter," Tiffany laughed.

"It's always Winter at breakfast-time," Agnes affirmed, unamused.

But Tiffany just laughed again, and this time Agnes laughed along. It wasn't that she found breakfast without bacon sarnies in the least bit funny, it was just that Tiffany had gone a long time without laughing, and now she did it all the time. Of course it was obvious why: Moo was dancing around the house singing to herself.

She'd heard it said that everyone should sing as though no one was listening. She'd once heard Tiffany sing and wished, probably along with the rest of the Disc, that she never heard anything like it again. It was one thing to sing flat, off-key and out of tune, but to really belt it out was quite another. She herself was classically trained, all be it in a rather odd way, and had sung, to great acclaim, at the Opera House in Ankh-Morpork. Perhaps that was why she always sang as though someone might be listening. Moo sang as though there might be no one else in the world. Agnes had often thought about the sound of Moo's singing. At first she's thought of songbirds or nightingales, but that was wrong as they were trying to attract other birds. She'd decided that it would be closer to say it was like a babbling brook: though it was lovely to listen to, the brook itself was making no effort, and it didn't even care. Whatever it was, it was beautiful, the more so as she seemed to make up tunes and lyrics as she went along.

"Does she know? " asked Agnes.

"Well, she knows it's a party; that why she's so happy. You know how she loves parties."

"She's always happy."

"Yes," Tiffany chuckled, "it can seem that way, but there are subtle differences if you pay close attention. Very close attention."

"So, she's happier than normal?"

"Of course, it's a party, and you know how she loves to get dressed-up. I had to spend an hour on her hair last night so that she could have ringlets today."

"And she knows it's her birthday?"

"Oh, yes."

"But we just decided it's her birthday, well Nanny did, just because everyone has to have a birthday."

"Yes, I know, I was there. But you know what she's like: tell her it's her birthday and she'll believe you; it's her birthday."

"And yet she can't connect a party on her birthday with its being her birthday party?"

"Nope."

"Is she thick?"

Tiffany laughed again and Agnes thought she would never grow tired of the sound. A bit like Moo's singing.

"I think we both know that she is farther from being _thick_ than anyone either of us has ever met. She's probably brighter than both of us put together. And I know that at least I'm quite clever."

"I'm cleverer."

"Shouldn't that be _more clever_?"

"No. Anyway, I take your point. So why can't she work this out?"

In the background they could hear Moo singing and laughing, and incorporating the laughter into her song.

"Because nothing like it has ever happened to her before and she can't think why it should."

"Then why haven't you told her?"

"Because then it wouldn't be a surprise, would it?"

"Do you want to see how she reacts?"

"Yes."

"So, you're experimenting on her?"

"Yes, but only because Nanny told me to."

"What!? Do you do everything Nanny tells you?"

"Yes. Don't you?"

"Well, yes, but that's not the point…"

"Yes, it is. Nanny knows something about Moo, or at least she suspects it, and this is her way of testing it."

"Well, ok, but I just hope it doesn't end in tears."

"Actually, I think that might be supposed to be the point."

Sean Ogg greeted them by the door, looking even more awkward than he normally did. This affair was strictly women and children only so Sean must have done something really bad for Nanny to have made him be valet.

"May I take your broomsticks, mistresses?" he asked, bowing.

"Good morning Sean," said Agnes, handing over her broomstick, "park it carefully."

"I will, miss," he said, taking Tiffany's too and heading round the side of the house.

Inside things had already started: several of the women were playing music in one corner of the parlour while lots of little girls danced around and the few little boys skulked round the edges. In truth though the party was everywhere: in the kitchen, the upstairs bedrooms, the stairs themselves… And in the corner opposite the band sat Nanny Ogg; beaming and chuckling, as only a nanny can in a room full of her grandchildren. They waited until the dance had finished and then made their way over to her.

"Good morning, Nanny," said Moo, bobbing a curtsy.

"Well, aren't you the prettiest little thing ever," replied Nanny, "with your curly hair and your lovely frock, come and give Nanny a kiss."

Moo jumped up into Nanny's lap and kissed her. Nanny, for her part, hugged Moo as if she were one of her own.

"Now, off you and play," said Nanny and, laughing, Moo did as she was told.

"Right," Nanny said to Agnes and Tiffany, "the cake's coming out at twelve so make sure you're ready."

"Noon on Mid-Year's Day," said Agnes, "a bit dramatic, isn't it?"

"Well, you'd know, you having been on the stage and all."

"Sorry, Nanny," said Agnes, blushing.

"Never mind that," said Nanny, "you go and help with the food, and Tiffany, you go and help Doris." She pointed across the room to where Margs' mum was re-braiding her hair for the third time that morning.

She sat down, plopped Margs on her knee and took the chaos that was her hair firmly in hand

"Thank you," said Doris, understandably exasperated, "I don't know how she does it."

Tiffany didn't know either, though she had her suspicions. Margs' hair was like a force of nature, but Tiffany had sometimes been able to control the weather, so she wasn't going to be defeated by an explosion of locks that fought you like snakes. It was going to be a hard fight though.

"Sit still, girl!" said Tiffany as Margs squirmed in her lap. She realised that this was a bit like asking a gargoyle to tap-dance, but it was worth a try.

"Can I tell Moo now, can I?" begged Margs.

"No, you can't," she said, gathering her hair so tightly that had she done it to Nanny Ogg it would have smoothed out all the wrinkles in her face. And probably earned her a one-way ticket to the Dungeon Dimensions. "Just be patient," she advised, though she knew it was like asking a cow to bark. It just wasn't something Margs was capable of.

"But it's nearly twelve," she pleaded, fidgeting even more.

"Nearly, but not quite," said Tiffany, "and if you don't sit still I'll send you home."

Surprisingly, it worked. Admittedly she'd had to use voice number six, but Margs had sat still while Tiffany plaited her hair more fiercely than she ever had before. She wasn't being cruel; it was just that the hair was constantly struggling to escape, jump a fence and break for the border. And _still_ wasn't entirely accurate either. To be fair to her she didn't jump up and down like she obviously wanted to, but her whole body thrummed with energy like an Octarine charge looking for a root to earth. When Tiffany finally let her go, with a braid that looked as though it had been fashioned from wire, it was like releasing a caged animal into the wild.

"Hard work," she said to Doris.

"A bit," Doris agreed, with a wan smile, "but Moo helps."

Tiffany watched as Margs grabbed Moo, swept her up and hugged her while Moo laughed as though she were being tickled.

"I think they just make it easy for each other." And they shared a little chuckle.

And tickling Moo was a strange thing too. She was more ticklish than anyone else that Tiffany had ever met, as she'd discovered one night when she'd tickled her ribs because she was slow getting into bed. Moo had gone down as though she's been hit by a poleaxe, in a fit of giggles. The thing was, unlike anyone else on the Disc, Moo liked being tickled. She went through all the usually contortions and guffaws like a normal person, but she never tried to get away. She would let Tiffany tickle her feet until she passed out or wet herself. For Tiffany, being tickled was like being tortured, yet Moo could get pleasure out of even that. She'd actually seen her laugh once when she'd been stung by a wasp. Bees never stung her.

And then the moment came. Agnes wheeled out the cake from the kitchen. It was huge and made of everything delicious that Agnes and Tiffany could think of. The candles around the edge looked minute because of its huge size, while in the middle Gladys had piped "Happy Birthday Moo". Moo herself took a while to register what was going on. In fact it probably wasn't until everyone started singing "Happy Birthday to Moo" that she finally twigged what was happening and then Tiffany felt what she and Agnes would come to call _The Surge._ It wasn't just that she felt happy for a little orphan having her first birthday party, though that made her feel good because she'd been partly responsible, no, this was different.

When they'd talked about it later they'd both agreed they had never felt better in their lives. It wasn't just happiness, it was pure, unadulterated joy and it filled them; not just mentally but physically: like the taste of a doughnut when you're really hungry, or the feeling of a hot bath on a cold day. But it was more even than that, it made you tingle, but it also made you feel good about yourself.

Then Moo fainted, and it was gone. Margs had caught her before she hit the ground and immediately she was surrounded by anxious people concerned for her safety. But while everyone else fussed around Moo, Tiffany looked over at Nanny. She might only have one tooth but when she mouthed the words there was no mistaking them:

I told you so.

 **Chapter 12**

Having washed and dressed Angua headed back downstairs, drawn by a smell that her nose was telling her was unmistakeable and her brain was telling her wasn't possible.

"Are you cooking with garlic!?" she asked, incredulously, as she came in to the kitchen.

"Of course I am," said Sally, "I am an artist; could you imagine a painter refusing to use blue?"

"Of course I could, painters are all mad, but not as mad a vampire chopping garlic."

"Times change, and we must all move forward. I mean, when's the last time you ripped someone's throat out?"

"Oh, not for weeks," Angua assured her, "but seriously, Sally, this sounds a bit like Lucy. Are you punishing yourself?"

"I am suffering for my art," said Sally, sweeping back her hair.

"Would you just be serious for one minute?!" Angua demanded, exasperated.

"Mind over Master."

"What? I don't understand."

"Let's just say that I'm not prepared to give in to my inner bloodsucker. I go out in the sunlight, after all."

"Well, not much, and well wrapped-up."

"Baby steps, my dear, baby steps."

"What about the other myths? I've been to your flat and it seems obsessively, almost compulsively tidy."

"Oh, I don't like mess, or untied bootlaces, but that's why I wear sandals."

"And is it true what you said about the stake through the heart not killing you?"

"I have to say that it would certainly sting a bit, but no, it wouldn't be fatal."

"What about cutting off your head?"

"Well that would kill virtually anything," laughed Sally.

"But not you?"

"No, not me."

"So, what does kill a vampire?"

"Ah, that would be telling."

"Do you think I can't be trusted with the knowledge?"

"I'd trust you with my life, my pretty one."

"But not with the means to take it away."

"Well, I know how you feel about vampires."

"Not you! Or your mum, or Lucy, or Vlad, or Otto or…"

"You know, some of my best friends are wolves but…"

"I know, I know; I can almost hear myself. It's like this Omnian thing, isn't it?"

"You know about that?"

"Of course I do, I'm not blind."

"Does Carrot know?"

"He does now. And what's The Watch doing about it? And you do mean Commander Carrot, don't you, sergeant?"

"Yes, former-sergeant, I do mean Commander Carrot. And what are we supposed to do about it? No one ever makes a complaint and the perpetrators slyly don't perpetrate when we're around to nick them."

"So what? Why didn't you tell Carrot?"

"You mean Commander…"

"Sally, don't!"

"Look, I report to Stronginthearm. I told him and it's his job to pass it up the chain of command."

Angua couldn't really argue, because that was the way things were supposed to be done.

"You could have spoken to me if you thought things weren't being done."

"I don't tell tales out of school," said Sally, affronted.

"As if you ever went to school," Angua snorted.

"I did, actually," sniffed Sally, "in fact I went to school with your great-great great-great-great grandmother."

"Fine, let's change the subject. Who were you in love with?"

"Now there's a tangent."

"What's a tangent?"

"Trigonometry, something your great-great great-great-great grandmother and I studied at school."

"Never you mind jommetry," Angua persisted, "who were you in love with?"

Sally looked at her blankly for a moment and the frowned:

"I don't know," she had to admit.

"What?!" yelled Angua, "that's insane! How can you not know who you were in love with?"

Sally's face was almost a parody of misery:

"I just can't remember. My parents did something to my memory, or his did, or hers…I just don't know."

"You don't know if you were in love with a boy or a girl?!"

Angua was beginning to wonder if she'd ever had a stranger conversation.

"Well, I don't know what I don't know," said Sally.

"Not even an inkling?"

Sally arched her eyebrows in a way that only a vampire can –Angua only had the one- and it was very easy to read. It said: I can see right through you, matey, now back-off if you value your blood-supply.

"Ok, cheap shot, sorry. And your mother went along with this?"

"No, I don't think so, but she won't tell me; she says it's better if I don't know."

"And you believe her?"

Sally scowled at her:

"Angua, I trust my mum even more than I trust you; and I would trust you with my soul, if I had one."

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that about your mum, but hasn't she given you any idea?"

"Well, sort of. I get the impression that I was considered to be of inferior stock," said Sally, blushing.

Vampires prided themselves on their chalk-white skin. For the sake of blending-in they were generally prepared to darken a few shades, depending on where they were preying. But blushing was considered so _infra dig_ that it could get you banned from all the worst clubs. Few believed they were even capable of it, and that was the root of the problem.

"WHAT!?" Angua exclaimed in disbelief, "Sally, your name is three pages long, your lineage goes back to before there were people and you have more titles than a moving picture; the Agatean Emperor would consider you a step up. Who could you possibly be inferior to?"

"Human blood," said Sally, morosely.

"Yes, I know, you used to drink it."

"No, I mean in me."

"That's where things generally go when you drink them."

"Don't be flippant," said Sally, irritably stamping her foot, "I meant in my bloodline."

"I know what you meant, it's just that you're so cute when you're angry."

"You've never seen me angry. You would like me when I'm angry; I go a funny green colour."

"What, a blue-blood like you?"

"Angua," said Sally firmly, "there is a fine line between joshing with a friend and infuriating glibness; you crossed that line a long time ago."

"Then why are you smiling?"

"Because you appear to know me better than I know myself."

"Does that mean you're going to tell all?"

"No."

"Aww," said Agua sulkily, "why not?"

"Because I have work to do –so do you- and the boys will be arriving shortly. I'll tell you soon."

"We may not reckon _soon_ in quite the same way."

"Well, I promise to tell you before I die."

Angua, though, wasn't so easily deflected:

"But do you promis to tell me before _I_ die?"

"That too," Sally chuckled.

"I'm not entirely convinced."

"Yeah? So, what are you going to do, bite me?"

As soon as Carrot came through the door she could see she didn't have to ask the question, still there were wifely duties that simply had to be done:

"How was your day, dear?"

"Khra'tz'grh!" he replied.

"Well, go and wash, we have guests, and wash your mouth out while you're at it, but not with the good soap."

Carrot's shoulders slumped which, given the size of his shoulders, was quite impressive in itself.

"I'm sorry, wife" he said.

Angua would have preferred "darling", but she now knew enough to appreciate that "wife" was one of the most loving and respectful things a dwarf could say. Hey ho.

"Never mind, dinner's nearly ready."

"Is Harry here?"

"Yes, he is, and he doesn't look any happier than you do."

"Good," Carrot affirmed.

"Oh, this is going to be a lovely evening."

It was simply the most awkward meal Angua had attended since her wedding day. In spite of all his assurances that the food was delicious, Harry ate almost nothing; nor did she or Sally. Only Carrot ate heartily: including the green soup, the fish and all the vegetables; a sure sign that he was furious.

"Perhaps we should clear up," Sally suggested, after Carrot's third helping of dessert.

"Yes," agreed Angua eagerly, "and leave the men to their brandy and cigars."

She didn't find that any funnier than the rest of them seemed to. And then a most peculiar thing happened: Sally tripped.

Vampires didn't trip. From second to second they were hyper-aware of their physical bodies. They could no more have an accident than they could sleep in a garlic-lined coffin. But that wasn't the most astonishing thing, because she had never seen anyone move like that before. It wasn't just the speed, which was incredible enough, but the grace with which he did it. Harry pivoted in his chair; caught the plates in one hand and Sally in the other. Sergeant vonHumpeding was quite slight, but to catch even a child with one hand…

"Oh, clumsy me," she apologised, taking the plates from Harry and scurrying out the door. Vampires didn't scurry.

"What was all that about?!" demanded Angua, when she joined Sally in the kitchen.

"I don't know," said Sally.

"Yes, you do, don't try that on me."

"Well, I'm not sure then," she conceded.

"About what?"

"About Harry. He's a vampire, of course."

"Who, Harry? No he's not, don't be daft!"

"Yes, he is. Trust me, I know whereof I speak. Who else can move like that?"

"Fine, I'll give you that, so what? So are you."

"No, Angie, I think it might be _him_."

"And by _him_ you mean what?"

"Do I have to spell it out?"

"Oh, you mean HIM?"

"Yes, HIM, who did you think I meant?"

"Well, there are lots of _hims."_

"Don't be stupid, or rude. I could feel it in the way he held me."

"He held you for about a second!"

"Believe me, we can tell."

"Can you, really?" Angua smiled.

For the first time that Angua could remember Sally looked completely nonplussed. And then it began to dawn on her.

"You knew?!" she almost yelled

"Not _knew_ , no, just suspected. It's a copper thing."

"Does _he_ know?"

"I think he probably does now."

Angua didn't think she'd ever seen so many emotions flash across a single face, but for once Sally was lost for words. Angua wasn't:

"You knew too."

"No, I didn't!" said Sally, affronted.

"Then why did you trip?"

"That was an accident!" sally protested. Angua said nothing, but simply waited. Sally blinked first:

"Alright, but I just wanted to see if he was a vampire. I didn't think it was _him_."

"Are you sure?"

"Nooo," Sally wailed, "I'm not sure of anything anymore."

"Finally, an honest answer."

Sally frowned: "So, what do I do now?"

"Well, those two need to talk, and so do we…"

"Right, come to my place, and bring…vine!"

Meanwhile Carrot and Harry were glaring at each other in a way that would have kept meat from going off for months. They both waited until they heard the banging of the door that told them the women had left. And then they waited a good deal longer.

"Well?" said Carrot, finally.

"Well," said Harry, "I had a meeting today with Nigel Trilby of the Small-businessmen's Association."

"How did that go?"

"It was as unpleasant as Lord Vetinari suggested it would be."

"And what did you learn?"

"That he wasn't quite as unpleasant as Cyril Garage of the Concerned Citizens Committee."  
"Sergeant, I am _really_ not in the mood," said Carrot, turning the freezer down another couple of degrees.

"Sorry, sir," said Harry. "They and all the other _community leaders_ seem to object to Omnian businesses."

"Which ones?"

"All of them, though Mr. Garage seems to particularly object to vegetarian restaurants."

"Why so?"

"He didn't seem sure, though he thought there was probably something about not eating meat that was offensive to god."

"Which god?"

"In Mr. Garage's case Offler the Crocodile God."

"He may have a point there."

"I think their point was that Omnians shouldn't be allowed to own businesses at all."

"Then how did they expect them to survive?"

"They didn't seem to care."

"And this is city-wide, is it?"

"As far as I can tell, sir, outside of The Shades, that it is."

"On both sides of the river?"

"Even in the posh bits of Ankh where they never see an Omnian. It's very widespread."

"Even more widespread that you might think," said Carrot, "and I've had a very unpleasant meeting of my own."

"Really, with whom?"

"Kelvin Side, editor of _The Post_ , and Lord Bothermore."

"That doesn't sound nice," Harry commiserated, "what was it about?"

"I asked them politely to stop stirring up hatred by printing lies."

"And what did they say?"

"That they were only listening to the voice of the people."

"And what was the voice of the people saying?"

"Whatever Lord Bothermore's newspapers told it to."

"Not very productive then?"

"Oh, it gets worse. I've been sending and receiving clacks all day. It seems that Omniphobia is not restricted to Ankh-Morpork, it's being reported in many parts of the Disc."

"But why?" asked Harry.

"I have no idea," Carrot admitted, "but I think the _why_ might be the least of our problems."

"How so?"

"Read your history. Have you any idea what the Omnian Army was capable of? Of course the soldiers were happy to die for Om, but warriors are always happy to die for their god."

"The difference is that they WERE soldiers?"  
"Exactly. That discipline can easily be recalled, if necessary. Across the Disc Omnians are being mistreated because people think they are helpless and can't fight back. Actually, they _don't_ fight back, but they're far from helpless. Of course, bullies never learn until you black their eyes, but these bullies might not get a black eye, but a spear through their hearts or a sword through their faces instead."

"And we'll be expected to stop it."  
"A policeman's lot is not a happy one."

 **Chapter 13**

In main editorial office of _The Ankh-Morpork Times_ , otherwise known as the office, the interruption game was in full swing.

"William, everyone else…" began Sacharissa.

"Who's everyone?" he demanded.

"Oh, let's see: The Voice, The People, The Post, The Clarion."

"And that's _everyone_ is it?" he re-demanded, "sorry for interrupting you."

"You didn't," she said, "that _is_ everyone."

"Oh, yes," he remembered. Then he whirled around and threw some papers across the room. Just for effect, as there was nothing written on any of them.

"William, listen, everyone is reporting this and…"

"They're not _reporting_ it; they're _saying_ it, he corrected, resuming the game, " _our_ reporters are saying…"

"Who do you mean by _our reporterS?_ "

"Alright, our reporter then. And our undercover reporter."

"We have a spy?"

"Yes, very close to Lord Bothermore."

"How unpleasant for him, or her, or it. And what does our reporter say?"

"She says it's absolute nonsense; that there isn't a single word of truth in any of it and that those responsible are utter blackguards."

This certainly sounded like Selene, _The Times_ ' sole remaining reporter, who was something of a conundrum, wrapped in a paradox, inside a stumper. To begin with, they were neither of them even sure what species she was. Apart from the tallest, thinnest female either of them had ever seen. A female _what_ remained a mystery. Sacharissa had ventured: sylph, shade, siren and spectre. Though William suspected this had more to do with her over-fondness for alliteration than with any sound reasoning.

What was 00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000undeniable was: she could get absolutely anywhere without being discovered, find out absolutely anything, was always totally accurate, produced precise and perfect copy, never told a lie and, most importantly, never expected any payment.

"And that should tell you all you need to know."

"William, apart from Selene our entire staff is: you, me and Otto, oh, and our secret, spy source. While all the other papers can't hire staff fast enough. The only reason we're still in business is because Lord Vetinari buys our entire print run, sends a few copies to his friends and has people give away the rest on street corners. And because Hadrid Copperplate is prepared to run them off, as a favour, in the downtime when he's working for _The Voice_. _That_ should tell _you_ something."

"What are you saying: that we should be the mouth of the mob?"

"No! But we shouldn't be the mouthpiece of The Patrician either!"

They slumped down in their chairs and glared at each other. Then they thought about it for a bit and just glowered at each other instead. The silence was very, very quiet. In the end Sacharissa cracked it:

"Everybody's saying it," she said, almost confirming her own point, "they can't all just be making it up."

"Selene says they are."

Sacharissa stopped for a moment and looked warily around the room.

"Selene," she said, "if you're there; I'm not saying I doubt you, really. But what about the photographs?"

"WHAT!?" yelled William, unbelieving.

Sacharissa was almost knocked over by all the punctuation.

"They're _our_ photographs. _Otto's_ photographs. Someone broke in here and stole them, don't you remember? Photographs of groups of Omnians defending their homes and shops, that they then printed a lot of lies about. And they didn't publish any of the ones he took of crowds throwing rocks through the windows of Omnian shops."

"Oh, William, for gods' sakes, look at the evidence!" she said, taking four newspaper front pages from her bag and throwing them on the desk between them, " _these_ aren't Otto's photographs!"

"No, miss," said Otto Chriek, materialising out of the shadows, impeccable in evening dress, as always, "ze are not photographs at all, ze are crude iconographs drawn by imps. Ze bear no more relation to reality zan do do ze portraits of ze artists."

"Otto!" said Sacharissa, taken unawares, "how did you get here?"

"I vurk here, young miss, I do not need a pass."

It wasn't as though anyone could forget that Otto was a vampire; the opera-cape was a dead giveaway. And it wasn't as though William had forgotten that, deep down, even the Black Ribboners were still monsters. But he had never before heard Otto speak with such chilling menace. By the shocked and frightened look on her face, Sacharissa hadn't done either.

"I'm sorry," she said, in a trembling voice, "I just didn't realise you were there."

And then he was gone in, if anything, an even more frightening way than the way he'd arrived."

Otto's daft idea had been that he'd wanted to create photography. It had turned him into a joke, –a vampire capturing sunlight- then an artist and finally, an invaluable resource for both police and press. Yet that one swift glance had reminded her of just what a terrifying thing he could become if he ever once lost his granite self-control. When the spooky silence had gone on for far too long, Sacharissa started in again:

"But what about the stories, William? " she persisted, "I'll accept that a dozen could just be a rumour, or a hundred, but thousands and thousands can't all be false."

"Well," said William, "I don't think there are thousands and thousands of stories; I think it's the same four or five passed around like Agatean Whispers until it sounds like everybody's saying…"

"Oh, you're trying to say…"

"No!" said Selene.

She was suddenly there. Otto had sort of become, in a spooky sort of way; Selene wasn't there. And then, all of a sudden, she was.

"There are thousands and thousands of stories; none with any basis in truth; all complete lies. Or perhaps you think I have some reason to lie about this myself."

She looked at Sacharissa in a way that was, by a long way, even colder than Otto had managed. Sacharissa shook her head vigorously.

"And I have no need for a pass either," the look she gave Sacharissa this time drained all the colour from her face, "I work here too."

She looked nervously around but she didn't have any friends in the room and, when Otto came back up from the basement with a large bag, she had one fewer.

"It zimply containz all my materialz," he explained, in case they suspected that it might contain a body.

"And I was just dropping off my last piece of copy," said Selene.

"What are you talking about!?" exclaimed Scharissa, "what about tomorrow's paper!?"

"But nobody reads _The Times_ ," said Selene, frostily, "you said so yourself."

"Well, not _nobody_ ," said Sacharissa, wondering just how long Selene had been there, "it doesn't mean we stop publishing!"

"But don't you we think we ought to if, as _everyone_ knows, we don't publish the truth."

Scharissa let that sink in; then she let it brew for a little and then she uncorked it. Women really could manage a lot of processes in two seconds.

"Oh, right!" she shouted, "I see what you're doing. Everyone's a dupe and an idiot apart from you three, right?"

"Well, not exactly _everyone_ ," said William, "there are quite a few others who…"

Sacharissa was as angry as an angry wasp, that's just been stung by a wasp.

"Oh, you nearly had me there!" she exclaimed, rising in dudgeon so high it should have towered over all of them, "well you can keep your sneering, smug, supercilious self-importance, and much good may it do you!"

And with that she flounced out, slamming the door behind her with such force that they were surprised _The Times_ didn't come down around them.

"A fine exit," said William, "though she's really going to have to get control of that alliteration."

"It's odd to have woman of whom you are at once so proud and so ashamed," said Selene.

"No one said life wasn't going to be semi-tough," agreed William.

"Never mind zis," said Otto, "zoon ze mob vill be comink vis zee flaming torches, just like ze old days, ah, ah ah…"

"Otto, please," Selene admonished.

"I'm zorry," he apologised, "I vorget myself zometimes."

Selene now took William aside and became far more corporeal than he'd ever seen her before.

"Listen," she said, "Otto wasn't joking. Well, actually he was, but people really are going to come here and burn this building down, tonight."

"How do you know?"

"I'm a reporter, it's on my CV, it's what I do."

"Let them come."

"Oh, don't be stupid. It's time for you to lock up and go.

When William started to object she placed a finger lightly on his lips:

"I know you'd like to stay, to be the last to leave, to go down with your ship… But Otto and I can survive a furnace, we've played this game before, you can't."

"But what are you two going to do?"

"Hmmm, I quite like being the helpless, terrified little girl at the upstairs window. He suggested he could dangle me in just my nightdress, by my skinny little ankle from the roof just as it begins to give way."

"Why on The Disc would you want to do that!?"

"Because one of the people who'd set fire to the place might actually regret that they'd done so."

"But then they might try to rescue you."

"Better still. Listen, William, whatever people may say, Otto is not a monster, and nor am I, but the people coming to burn this place down tonight really are, or are controlled by one."

"What does that mean?"

"I'm not sure, it's just a feeling."

"And what about Sacharissa?"

"She's hard of thinking, I'm afraid. Or she just isn't thinking about what she's hearing."

"Isn't that true of all of them?"

"Well, yes, I suppose, but she's a lot better at thinking than they are. Don't worry about her, she can take care of herself and I'll keep an eye on her too. Get out, lock the door and get yourself safe. We'll be in touch."

William de Worde did as he was told. He even thought of throwing the key on the river; it would only lie there and he could always walk over and pick it up later if he changed his mind. In the end he decided to keep it because it would make a good symbol. _The Times_ was going underground, in fact he could almost hear Lars Larssonson's hammer in the mines where the presses were being forged. He had no idea how he was going to pay for this but he knew that TRUTH would find a way. And then someone cracked him over the head with a brick and knocked him out.

For her part, Sacharissa had long since walked off her fury, then her rage, then her anger and finally even her annoyance. But she still wasn't happy. What she needed was a carefully crafted cup of coffee, and she knew just the place.

There were those who liked the robust jolt of a Klatchian roast and those who preferred the dark mysteries of Howondaland; some went for the subtleties of Genua and still others the bittersweet virtues of Omnia… But her heart would always belong to Quirm and, more especially to Carlito's Caffé. Carlito himself had long since gone to meet The Tall Dark Stranger but he had left instructions that one single exception should be made to his rule of not permitting cappuccino to be sold after eleven o'clock in the morning. The exception was Sacharissa, but she'd been going to Carlito's since she was a little girl. She didn't even have to order.

"Signorina Sacharissa, buonasera," said Giovanni Fabbro from behind the counter, "Ava seat and I shalla bringa da usual."

Sacharissa took a table by the window and waited for her marvellous, milky magic. Giovanni was no more from Quirm than she was, but it paid to keep up appearances, and he did really love his coffee, which was no doubt why it was so good. She was beginning to have some doubts about the Omnians, now that she thought about it. No one seemed to give two hoots about barristas from Quirm, or Genuan sommeliers, or Klatchian chefs, or barmen from Fourecks…so what was it about the Omnians, uniquely, that seemed to get up people's noses? Just then her fabulous, frothy fun arrived.

"Grazi," she said.

"Prego," replied Giovanni.

"How's Mama?"

"Not three bad, miss, not three bad," he said, lapsing into his normal Morpork accent, "she suffers sumink shocking with her lumbago, but she dunt complain, gawds luv 'er."

"Eh, John," she said, as he was turning away, "do you have any problems with Omnians?"

"Well, none o' my business, miss," he said, "but you do 'ear stories duntya."

"Yes, you do. Thank you."

"Itsa no problem," he said, getting back into character, "enjoya youra caffé."

Yes, that was the thing, wasn't it? You heard stories and, if you heard them often enough, in enough different places, then you might start believing in those stories while not worrying too much about where those stories came from.

Sure, the Omnians had a weird and nasty religion, or at least it had used to be nasty, now they just spewed endless love and forgiveness. But their faith wasn't any weirder than worshipping Offler the Crocodile God, and even in their bad old days they hadn't been as bad as the Bitter Brethren of Broch, just for one example. So, what was it about them? And then all of a sudden there were lots of people with torches outside the window. She was tempted to rush out immediately, but more tempted by her delicious, dairy delight, so she drank her coffee as the crowd surged past. And then she latched on to the tail of what she could see was a story; she didn't know what the story was but this was an angry mob and she was still _technically_ a reporter for _The Times_.

Unfortunately, it turned out that the mob didn't seem to know any more about the story than she did.

"So, what's happening?" she asked the man next to her.

"Dunno, love," he said, "bloody Omnians, I suppose."

Well, she could just have made that up herself, couldn't she? Couldn't she?

"So, why are you here?"

"Well, it's an angry mob, innit? And I'm as partial to a mob as the next bloke. See a mob; join in, always good for a laugh."

She tried pushing forward and asking more people but none of them seemed to know any more about why they were there than Mr. Join-a-Mob. And then, unexpectedly, she was back to where she'd been just an hour before; the difference was that now _The Times_ building was on fire. Apparently the Omnians had done it. In the crowd she spotted Muir Dock, one of the reporters from _The Post._

"So, what's going on?" she asked.

"The Omnians have set fire to _The Times_ ," he replied.

"Why would they do that?"

"Who knows?"

"But why _The Times_ , the only paper that consistently defends them? Why not _The Post_ that calls them "cockroaches" and "scum"?"

"Oh, it's just typical of them," he said, automatically, although he looked slightly confused by his own answer.

And then there was a tiny, terrified little-girl at an upstairs window and these people just jeered. Luckily the girl's eyes met hers and she knew it was Selene. But even as she fought through the crowd to get home to a bath and wash the smell of these people off her, she knew she would never feel clean again.

 **Chapter 14**

He had thought of it as a test. Of course, everything was a test of some sort or other when it came down to it. This one had been designed as a test of how compatible he and Bliss were, but also of whether or not his new face could fool even people who had known him. He had dined at the Guild of Cuisiniers –motto: Cum grano salis- often in the past, but he had never before taken a woman there. Not only did chefs not seem to approve of women cooking or being in the kitchen; they didn't seem to approve of women at all. But Patrick always knew to whom he should be _particularly polite_ in order to get his way. Assassins never _bribed_ and more than they ever _murdered_.

So here they were enjoying the fifteen course tasting-menu, each course accompanied a complimentary drink: wine, beer, vodka…even water! Though no _chernobil_ , he noted, for gods knew what that stuff would ever compliment, apart from major psychological derangement. Over the snail's liver pâté he decided to go for broke:

"Bliss," he said, "how much do you like me?"

"I think you are the most wonderful man I have ever met, or ever hope to meet," she said, "This is delicious, isn't it?"

And here, across this table, was where the very first dumb was struck. He stared at her, open-mouthed, and then she laughed.

"You're not serious, are you?" he said, smiling.

"Of course not, silly," she said smiling back.

He didn't know whether to be relieved or heartbroken.

"Phew," he finally managed. She laughed her lovely, tinkley laugh:

"I'm actually hopelessly in love with you; I was just practising my Ankh-Morpork sense of humour."

Smacked in the gob, again"

"Bliss!" he exclaimed, "you're confusing the hells out of me!"

"Oh, I'm sorry," she said, sounding genuinely contrite, "it's just that some of the other nurses said that's what girls are supposed to do."

Yes, he thought, at least in Ankh-Morpork he supposed they were.

"So what would you say if I asked you to marry me?"

"I'd say: thank you, my lord, I'd honoured to be your wife."

"Are you being serious now?"

"No, I'd really say: where's the ring?"

"The engagement ring?"

"Naturally, and would you want me to wear it on my toe or through my nose?"

"Erm, on the ring-finger is more usual. The clue is in the name."

"Really? You're such strange people."

"Bliss, please," he said, exasperated, "would you be serious just for a second?"

"Oh, alright then. I knew the moment I first saw you that I wanted to be your wife, bear your children and spend the rest of my life with you. Is that clear enough?"

Well, he had to say that that was indeed clear enough, even for someone as evidently stupid as he was. So here was the moment.

"Blister the Eyes of the Doubters with the Brilliance of thy Faith Shivarananom, will you marry?"

"With all my heart, my love."

"You are being serious this time, aren't you?"

"Oh, yes."

"I mean really serious?"

"Any more of this and I might go off you."

"Do I need to ask your father's permission?"

"You already have."

"Really!? What did he say?"

"Patrick," said Blister, frowning, "we've been engaged for about thirty seconds, do you really want to get chucked this early?"

From the soup made from eagles' nests and dolphins' fins to the songbirds drowned in brandy that you had to eat with a napkin over your head, the rest of the meal passed in a blur. When they finally left Patrick was euphoric, while Blister was in a state that his previous girlfriends might have called _merry_ or even _squiffy_ but that Bliss called _pished_. He didn't know where she'd picked that up as he was fairly sure it was a Nac-Mac-Feegle word.

And so they walked along, hand in hand, giggling and kissing, and occasionally lurching violently sideways as if trying to avoid some large, invisible object. They'd decided to take the long-cut back to the Nurses' Home down various little alleys which is how they came to run into _the lads._

Bliss noticed them first, for a variety of reasons, one of which was that Patrick seldom paid attention to people in the street until one of them was stupid enough to try and hit him. He felt her grip tighten and then vaguely detected her trying to yank him backwards. Nurses are notoriously strong, nature of the job, but that rather depended on who you were comparing them to.

"Patrick, run!" she hissed.

"Why, darling?"

" _Them!"_ she tried to yell through clenched teeth and pointed.

"Oh, that's just kids having fun," he said, nonchalantly.

It was a phrase he'd picked up from Bruise, the new barmen at The Duck. Bruise was from Fourecks and had a talent for understating acts of violence that appealed to Patrick. "I just tickled his chin" meant _"I broke his jaw_ ". Because these were as far from _kids having fun_ as the Hub was from the Rim; what they were were nine large, ugly, drunken men whose evenings ended in them doing something horrible to a complete stranger or else they'd go home disappointed. And beat-up their wives.

"Oi, what you doin wif one o' them?" asked The Leader of this Sack who, it turned out, was called Alf.

With one hand Patrick drew Bliss behind him and with the other produced a small book from one of his many pockets.

"Ah, this," he said, brandishing it, "It's called a BOOOOOK and what people do is that they REEEEEAD them. You should try it; you can get ones with lots of pictures in them, it can be fun."

"Are you tryin'a be clever?" said Alf, not quite sure if he was being insulted.

"Hmmm," said Patrick, "well, I wouldn't have to try very hard to be cleverer than you."

 _The Assassins Code_ stated quite clearly: "you must never play with your food; it is unprofessional". However, as with virtually all of _The Code_ , exceptions could be made in exceptional circumstances such as: if you really wanted to. At this point even Alf knew he was being insulted.

"Yeah, is that right, well maybe I'll just 'ave a bit of fun with that little thing you've got behind you," he said and lunged at Patrick, but all he got was an uppercut that knocked him _spark out_. His mates Bert and Fred caught him as fell backwards unconscious, and got a fist in the mouth and an elbow in the eye for their trouble. Steve-o got a forehead on the bridge of his nose and the rest just got what was coming to them; which in this case was Patrick. The whole thing took less than thirty seconds, after which he eased them into a moaning, bleeding, semi-conscious pile with his boot.

"Now listen carefully," he began, "I shall say this only _twice_ , as you are clearly incredibly stupid people: I represent the Ankh-Morpork Watch, and if we find any of you trying anything like this ever again then the experience you've just had will feel like being given a warm bath by a particularly talented Seamstress. So, just to be clear…"

At this point he turned to make sure his audience was appreciating his performance, only to find it looking absolutely appalled. And then she bolted. Once again all his pluses were non-ed, and that brief hesitation gave her the edge in the race.

"Bliss, what's wrong?" he called after her, "where are you going?"

"Go away and leave me alone!" she yelled back, "and don't call me _Bliss_."

"But what have I done!?"

"Don't ever try to see me again!"

And then she was gone. He was quicker than her, but she knew these streets better than he did. There were only two places she might have been headed and the Nurses' Home was closer. He knew, with an Assassin's sense of place, exactly where it was, but he didn't know the quickest way to get there, and he knew she did. There was no way he was going to catch her up.

When he got to the Nurses' Home Bauxite from Troll Security was barring the door.

"Good, evening," said Patrick, putting on his charming voice, "I'd really like to speak briefly with Nurse Blister."

He might as well have tried to charm a wall. Actually, if you thought about it, he _was_ trying to charm a wall.

"No un comes in," rumbled Bauxite, with great finality.

"I just need a few words," Patrick explained.

"No un comes in."

"I don't have to come in; you could just give her a message."

"No un comes in."

"Or perhaps I could speak with one of her colleagues."

"No un comes in."

"Can you say anything apart from 'No un comes in'?"

"Nah." Bauxite affirmed.

Great, now he was being patronised by a troll. Even with all his strength and _skills_ there was no way he was getting through this door. With his Assassins training he could obviously climb up to her window, but he wasn't sure which one that was, and wasn't sure that in this situation it was the right approach…and then there was Shame peeking between Bauxite's legs:

"Patrick, please, you have to leave," she said.

"I just want to speak to her," he pleaded.

"But she doesn't want to speak to you, ever again, and it's breaking her heart. If you actually love her leave her alone."

"What!? Why!?"

"You know why," said Shame, and was gone.

Now, Patrick had heard this many times in the past. In answer to such questions as: why won't you sign over all your assets to me? Why don't you want to involve your best friend in our lovemaking? And on and on, but on those occasions he had, most definitely, known why. This time he didn't have a clue.

Miserably he began to drag his feet back towards The Duck, he might not always like his customers, but he mostly understood them, even the mad ones and the weird ones… but somehow not the girl to whom he'd been engaged not a half-an-hour before and who now never wanted to speak to him again. He had no idea what was going on.

"I have no idea what's going on!" he announced to Kate and Bruise, who were having a nightcap when he got back to the bar.

"What's the problem, mate?" asked Bruise, "you look like shit."

"My fiancée has just called off the wedding and chucked me," said Patrick, morosely.

"I didn't know you were engaged," said Kate, "how long has that been going on?"

"A couple of hours," he replied, offhandedly.

"Strewth, mate," exclaimed Bruise, "that's gotta be a record!"

"What the hells did you do?!" asked Kate.

"Nothing," said Patrick, "that's the problem. At least when I got chucked in the past I knew it was my fault."

"Trust me sweetheart," she said "I am an old head on young shoulders and I know you did something." Then she glared at Bruise as he looked like he was going to laugh. "Tell me what happened?"

"OK," he said, though he wasn't sure he wanted Bruise to hear this, "we were out having a lovely meal. I proposed and she accepted."

"Did you give her a ring?" asked Bruise.

"No, I wasn't expecting to propose to her."  
"There you go then, that explains it. You should always carry a ring, just in case."

"Do you often propose to a girl on the spur of the moment?"

"All the time, mate, famous for it."

"And do any of them ever…?"  
"I hate to interrupt this fascinating conversation, but that wasn't the problem," said Kate.

"No, it wasn't," Patrick agreed.

"So, then what happened?" she asked.

"I was walking her home when we were attacked."

"By whom?"

"I don't know, just a bunch of thugs."

"How many?" asked Bruise.

"Nine."

"And what did you do?" asked Kate

"I beat them up."

"Good one!" exclaimed Bruise, "fair play to you, mate."

"Then that is the whole problem," said Kate.

"Eh!?" said Patrick and Bruise simultaneously.

"Let me quote unto you the Book of Brutha, chapter eighty-nine, verse sixty-five: _It is better by far to suffer infinite hurts than inflict a single one on another._ I have a few Omnian friends.

"Oh," said Patrick, making a rude hand gesture at Bruise's smirking face, "you have got to be forking joking!"

 **Chapter 15**

Sally's little flat was in The Shades, a place where girls really shouldn't walk on their own because it wasn't safe. Luckily, for the local thug-population, word had got around that trying to attack either of these two _girls_ would have been about the un-safest thing they had ever done in their, very soon to be terminated, lives.

It was the tidiest, cleanest most span-and-spick place Angua had ever seen. Vampires were notorious for -among many, many other things- being compulsively, obsessionally, tidy and clean. Sally mostly tried not live down to her stereotype but this was the exception. Though her hair could be tousled, even dishevelled if the occasion called for it, there would never be a single stray hair out of place in this little shrine to order. Angua drew her finger along the top of the bookshelf and tutted:

"Gods, when did you last clean this place?"

"I did it as you were walking up the stairs, as well you know. I'm a Black Ribboner, but giving up cleaning too would be like trying to chuck smoking and drinking on the same day."

"You don't smoke."

"Not anymore, but I used to: long, thin cigarillos, to make me appear more rakish, daring and enticing to the boys. And the girls."

"Really?"

"Oh, yes! The blood tastes just as good, whatever cup you drink it from."

"Sally, stop it!"

"Well, you started it."

"No I didn't!"

"Yes, you did, you invaded…"

"SALLY!"

"OK," she agreed, "pour us some…vine, and I'll tell you everything. Or at least everything I remember."

They were curled up together on the settee, the way they used to be before Angua had had children. To her it seemed like old times, except all this stuff was new.

"Now, the thing is," Sally began, "it's our dirty little secret and considered rather _infra dig_ …"

"You sleep in coffins full of dirt and bite people for a living. What could possibly be beneath your dignity?"

"Any more of that and I'll be taking my ball back."

"Oh, no!" cried Angua,"I haven't been to a ball in years."

"Oh, sorry, for a moment there I mistook you for my friend. I wonder where she went, I'm sure she was around here somewhere just a moment ago…"

"Ok, alright, I'll behave, sort of, I promise, sort of, but only if it's a good story."

"Oh, it's a belter, I can assure you."

"Then I shall be a good girl and listen carefully."

"Very well, then," Sally began, "as I was saying, we have a little secret: vampires sometimes find humans attractive, and I don't mean just as a snack…"

"Can I just ask something?" Angua interrupted.

"Oh, if you must," sighed Sally, "what is it this time?"

"Is it just humans? Aren't there any dwarf vampires."

"We're not an off-shoot, you know? We're a different species! But yes, there are vampires that prey on dwarfs, but they never come above ground. Now, can I get back to my story?"

"I'm all ears."

"Actually you're mostly fur, but the ears are quite elongated."

"Oh, cheap," said Angua, "and unworthy of you, but I'll stop interrupting. Go on."

"Right, vampires often reproduce dentally; that whole love at first bite thing you've heard about: the right nibble and Fanny becomes Fangsy. This is considered to be perfectly normal and no one thinks any less of these new vampires for having once been human, as there isn't an oz of human left in them. Otherwise we beget much like any other species; though with a great deal more drama and only on dark and stormy nights.

"But once in a while a male vampire may actually mate with a human female and produce a hybrid. This is generally regarded as being rather unsavoury. However, the child –always a boy- usually gains a grudging acceptance and the matter is hushed up. In fact some girls feed on rumours, as well as blood, and like the idea of a bit of human in a man. They think it lends them a certain raffish quality. But very, very rarely it happens the other way round: a vampire mother gives birth to a part-human child.

"Such a child –always a girl- is considered to be an abomination; she should not even exist and, if discovered, is immediately destroyed. Such children can hardly survive into adulthood, given their status, but the merest hint of such a being anywhere in your lineage is social poison."

"Why, for gods' sakes!? What's the big difference?"

"Because the girls have real human feelings. The boys may, occasionally, manifest emotions such as embarrassment, or even fear, but they are otherwise as selfish and heartless as any decent vampire. It is the girls who are rumoured to feel things like empathy and pity."

"Is that what happened to Lucy?" asked Angua.

"No! No one really knows what happened to Lucy, but it wasn't that. Oh, humans can be monsters, but they couldn't do the things that La Donna Lucrezia did without at least feeling something; even if it was only pleasure. And apparently she rather liked being tortured herself," said Sally, doing that whole vampire-eyebrow-arching thing.

"Well that certainly explains a lot, because I think she still does."

"Perhaps," Sally mused, "but there is nothing in her family history, it is impeccable; no suggestion of anything untoward, not the least hint of any act of kindness in centuries."

"Right, well, anyway, back to you."

"Yes, back to me, because I'm the important one. So, there have been rumours of such a girl in our family for as long as I can remember…"

"You can't even remember who the love of your life was…"

"Will you, please, just let me finish?"

"Sorry," said Angua, with no hint of an apology, "was there any truth in these rumours?"

"My mother loves me and I love her back. I sometimes call her 'mum', for gods' sakes! What more evidence do you need?"

"Ah!" said Angua, as the match finally caught, "and you fell in love with someone; it wasn't so much who you fell in love as that you fell in love at all."

"Precisely. We do lust, obviously, but we don't do love. Uh, uh, no way, yuck, yuck, yuck, nasties!"

"A bit tacky?"

"Stickier than glue," Sally confirmed.

"So what are we going to do now?"

"What is this _we_ of which you speak?" wondered Sally aloud.

"If you think for an instant that you're going to exclude me from helping my best friend find her lost love, then I'll blow your house down."

"Not if it's made of bricks you won't."

"Be serious. What future do you envisage here."

"Oh, I can envisage more futures than I can throw a stick at, and I wouldn't want to go throwing any sticks around you; you'd just fetch."

"Rowf!"

"If you want, though, I'll tell you what's going to happen and it's more melodramatic than one of those _Look! Books_."

"What!? All the celebrity gossip? You don't read those, do you?"

"No, but you do."

"Oh, ah, well, er…" Angua began, suddenly embarrassed, "only since I had the children. They take my mind off things."

"I thought they were aimed at people who didn't have minds."

"Hah! Insults now, is it?"

"Yes."

"Never mind all that, get on with your envisaging."

"Ok, this is what I think should happen. You know Lance-Constable Smite?"

"The cute Omnian boy, yes."

"Well, he belongs with Kate from _The Duck and Run_."

"And why would that be?"

"Because he's sweet and knows almost nothing about anything, whereas Kate knows everything about everything."

"That sounds reasonable, go on."

"Then there's that pretty nurse Blister at Morpork Mercy…"

"Which one is she? They're all pretty."

"The REALLY beautiful one."

"Oh, yes, she's best friends with Smite's girlfriend, Shame, isn't she?"

"Yes, and she should go with Patrick from _The Duck_?"

"Why?"

"Same reasons as Kate and Smite: she's an innocent abroad while he knows far, far, far more than he lets on."

"Doesn't that make him a bit dangerous?"

"Oh, yes," agreed Sally, "but not to Blister; Kate would know."

"And what about Shame herself, if Smite is no longer available?"

"Well, I've been having words with Vlad about her, but I'm not sure he's actually corrigible. Mind you, she only seems to have eyes for Igor and I can't see that as being a bad thing for a girl; as a learning experience, if nothing else."

Angua simply couldn't help herself: "Which Igor?"

"What do you mean _which Igor_?!" Sally demanded, incredulous, "have you seen her with another Igor?"

"Eh, no, I just thought…"

"It better not be Igor who works with Ecth-ray, you know, the one who sets the bones, because he puts the moves on everyone, though he does a massage that is simply to kill for. And if it's Igor from _Stomach and Intestines_ , then he's already married. And if it's Igor from _Heart and Lungs_ then get in line because the queue is already quite long, and I'm in it…"

Angua could only stare. It was as though a door had been opened for the first time and behind it lay…incomprehensibility. In the end Sally took pity on her:

"You can't tell the difference, can you?"

"Between Igors, of course I can; so can everyone."

"That's not what I mean. What you can't tell is that when they say _Igor_ it always sounds different, as different as _Sally_ and _Angua_. And you can't remember one set of mismatched features from another. I don't feel it's fair to ask more of _foreigners_ , but of a fellow Überwaldean…"

"You know, Salicia," Angua sighed, "sometimes you can make a point so sharply that I want to take it and hammer it through you black and evil heart."

"I've told you that that doesn't actually work; it's just a myth. Now, will you hear me out?"

"I don't think I have an option, and I won't say the ears thing again."

"So, Harry with Lucy –he already looks out for her, you know?- because she needs some stability in her life for a while. A couple of centuries ought to do it."

"And Vlad wouldn't do?"

"Gods, no, he'd eat her alive. Possibly quite literally."

"Oh, I don't know. From what I've heard our little Lucy was quite the tyrant back in Quirm. Quite literally."

"That was a long time ago; times change."

"Not as much as you might think," Angua disagreed, "let me tell you what I foresee. Patrick and Blister, yes, for the reasons you mention. On the other hand, Kate has had enough younger men, and I daresay will have a lot more. Now what she needs is someone older, a lot older, so I say Vlad."

"Ok, perhaps," laughed Sally, "though I doubt there's anything we could say that would influence either of them."

"Agreed. But Lucy goes with Smite."

"And your reasoning there would be?"

"She needs someone who will love her without reservation; who will treat her with gentleness and kindness… But above all she needs someone who will forgive her, and mean it."

"And what does Smite get out of this?"

"Anyone that innocent and trusting needs to be protected from the Big Bad World. Can you think of anyone better able to do that?"

"No, I can't," Sally conceded, after a few seconds thought, "not even me. So, Lucy protects Smite and Patrick protects Blister; what about Shame?"

"Well, as you know better than I do, though the hands of an Igor are generally the hands of a healer, if you don't want those very powerful hands around your throat, you shouldn't get on the wrong side of them."

"Which isn't easy to do, given that some of them can see round the backs of their own heads."

"Yes, that's very funny, Salicia," said Angua, clearly unamused.

"Oops, now I'm in trouble," laughed Sally, unabashed.

"It's love, you see, or rather: _you_ don't see. Shame loves Igor; loves him for what he does rather than for what he looks like and, bizarrely, he loves her for the same reasons.

"Oh, you can see the desire and lust in Patrick and Bliss, but you can't see that Smite simply loves Lucy, totally and hopelessly and she loves him back equally; in the brief moments when she allows herself to feel worthy of that."

"Yes, this is a beautiful story, Angua, but not every Omnian can have their own dedicated, highly-dangerous bodyguard."

"No," Angua agreed,"that's what the Watch is for, and why Harry met Sally."

"Oh, you bitch! Literally," snarled Sally.

"Grrrr, who's showing their fangs now?"

The tension between them was so great that had someone snapped it they would have ended up on opposite sides of the Disc. They were nose to nose; they were eyeball to eyeball…and they could both go hours without blinking. Then Angua's eyes tracked a single tear down Sally's cheek.

"Gotcha!"

She hugged Sally to her tighter and harder than she'd ever hugged anyone before, including her children and Carrot. Mostly because if she had done she'd probably have broken their spines. She couldn't work out how anyone could possibly cry so much. Oh, she knew soppy girls, mostly teenagers, who could cry for hours, but that was just time, not volume. After about half-an-hour her dress was sodden, Sally's dress was sodden and there were puddles forming. Angua could understand heart-break, any woman could, but not the amount of liquid. This simply wasn't possible, unless Sally was tapping into ground water. It certainly wasn't coming from the Ankh, because it was clear.

Eventually, after an awfully long time, the wracking sobs gave way to more low-level distress and, finally, just bubbling.

"Well, we clearly needed to get that out, didn't we?" soothed Angua in her best mum-voice.

"es," was all Sally could manage, in a voice so tiny that no human could have heard it.

"And are we feeling better now?" she asked, brushing her cheek.

Sally just sniffed and then looked up at her with eyes as helpless and trusting as Ire's, yet at the same time so filled with heartache and loss that Angua could feel tears from all over her own body rushing towards her eyes in the hope of breaking free.

"Well, I think we should start with a nice cup of tea and perhaps a piece of cake. Wouldn't that be nice?"

"That would be lovely," said Sally, in a still small voice.

"Would you like a handkerchief?"

Beneath her hands Angua felt a sudden change. What a moment before had been a wet sheet wrapped around some twigs was now muscle and iron once again.

"No thank you, mummy," said Sergeant von Humpeding, producing a piece of silk from her sleeve, "I have one of my own."

"Of course you do," said Angua, "and you don't even appear to need it. It's not as though there are any tears or a runny nose, or anything, though I'd swear there was one here only a second or two ago. Also, you don't have puffy eyes and your makeup doesn't look as though it's run; even though it appears to be all over my dress."

"It's called _Allure_ , you can get it in all the best Perfumier's."

"Oh, good," so what do we do now?"

"Well," said Sally, thoughtfully "I go and have a word or two with Herr Dreck und Messing, while you and Carrot hang around outside the door to make sure I don't kill him."

 **Chapter 16**

Moo was asleep upstairs in Nanny's bed and all the guests had left. The grumpy, disappointed children had been promised a _Moo's Unbirthday Party_ only a week hence, but that was at least six months in kid years. Now Agnes and Tiffany waited while Nanny sipped her _tea_ and chortled away to herself.

"Are you planning to let us know what happened today any time soon?" Tiffany asked, as sternly as she could in the face of Nanny's overflowing good humour.

"Oh, yes," smiled Nanny, "very soon, my chick."

"What would be _soon_ in human time?" asked Agnes, who had known Nanny longer than Tiffany had.

"Why, right now, my poppets."

There was a long pause while Agnes and Tiffany waited and Nanny sipped her drink and chuckled.

"Go on," they said in unison when they thought they had waited long enough.

"Well, it's like this," she began, as though she were speaking to children which, from her perspective, is exactly what they were.

"There's good witches and bad witches: them is as good at witching and them as ain't, you see?"

They both nodded.

"Now, I'm a good witch and so are you two and so was Esme, gods rest her, and others. But Old Mother Dismass or our own dear queen couldn't witch for chocolate, you get my meaning?"

Again they both nodded, though feeling slightly treasonous with regard to Queen Margrat.

"And then there are Good witches and Bad witches, ones that we couldn't hold a black, dripping candle to. Black Aliss was a rotten, wicked old crone who baked children in her oven, but she had this great evil power that sparked off her and made everyone near her feel sick. And she was powerful good at the witching itself.

"On the other side there was Glinda, the Good Witch of the Hub, who could no more think an ill thought than she could do a bad deed. She went around righting wrongs and healing the sick; just seeing her made you feel glad to be alive. They happen every century or so for no reason anybody knows…

"You'll need to breathe out soon or you'll do yourselves an injury!" she laughed.

They both did, with a great deal of relief, because they hadn't realised they'd been holding their breaths.

"So is Moo a Good witch?" asked Tiffany. Nanny nodded.

"As Good as it gets."

"And that's why we all felt so great at the party?" Agnes asked.

"Yip," Nanny affirmed, "and it's just as well she's so good at being Good, because what she's going to have to beat is something that's really, really, really Bad."

"Where?" asked Agnes.

"When?" asked Tiffany.

" _Where_ is in the Big Wahoonie. As for _when_ , well that depends how quick you can train her up, but don't go taking too long; the omens are gathering."

"Nanny, how do you know all this?" asked Tiffany.

"Because, my pet, I'm near my end and it is given to us witches to see things at that time." Both young witches suddenly looked sombre, but Nanny just laughed: "oh don't you go worrying about me, I'm quite looking forward to it. I likes an adventure and a chat with the Tall Man. And I might get to see Esme again."

They both smiled and suddenly felt very cheerful.

"I think young Miss Smith has just woken-up," said Nanny.

Sure enough Moo came down the stairs a moment later with a dozy smile on her face. But then her face dropped.

"Aw, where is everyone, did I miss the party?"

"They all had to go," said Tiffany.

"Even Margs!?" asked Moo, with a face that would have melted a banker's heart.

"Yes, my chick, we made her go," said Nanny, "but they'll all be back next week and we'll have a proper birthday party for you. As long as you promise not to faint."

"Yippee," cried Moo, clapping her hands "I promise!"

They all knew that Moo wouldn't faint the next Saturday because, more than anyone on the Disc, she was a woman of her word.

"On the other side, though," Nanny continued, and both Agnes and Tiffany could actually feel Moo's apprehension, "You're going to have to start learning proper witching from tomorrow."

"Whoopee!" she whooped, jumping up and down, and they felt the joy surge through them. It was like drinking North Field, but without all the staggering about; or the hangover. She really did make you feel good to be alive.

Moo's _Other Birthday Party_ came and went and everyone said it was the best time they could ever remember having; without actually being able to say why. And then the training began, if _training_ it could be called, because it was a lot more like pointing and watching.

Tiffany taught her how to fly a broom by basically giving her a broom and saying "fly it". Yes, they'd chosen the branch together –but Moo had trimmed it herself and, after they had gathered the twigs, she had taught her how to bind them. But then Moo had jumped on the finished article and been gone, in an instant. Admittedly, her first landing hadn't been great. She'd come in too fast, tried to stop too quickly, buried the tip in the dirt and smashed into the privy. That had required sponging down in a warm, herbal bath and massaging with various soothing balms. But the next morning, black and blue all over, she couldn't eat her breakfast fast enough so that she could get back on.

Agnes told her it was the same with her. One day of basic hexing and she had made Mr. Dunkanschmidd feel so bad about beating his dog that he'd thrown himself in the river and had had to be fished out before he drowned himself. Agnes had admitted to being slightly disappointed.

It wasn't empathy it was Ifeelexactlywhatyoufeelpathy. Tiffany didn't know how she coped with it. When a baby cried Moo's shoulders slumped, and then she straightened them and the baby stopped crying. An old curmudgeon would be almost apoplectic about some children in his apple trees and Moo would look thoughtful; suddenly Mr. Grumpy would smile ruefully and mutter: "Oh, I suppose I was a kid once." Nanny had been right, unsurprisingly, Moo was goodness made manifest and she did it without any seeming effort, apart from the bees.

Granny Weatherwax had taught Tiffany how to _borrow_ and Tiffany had taught Agnes. They could slip inside another creature's mind and just sit there, watching. They never tried to influence the hawk, the badger, the eel…they just observed. It was part of the reason witches knew so much, about so many things. But of course some creatures were more difficult than others. Dogs were ridiculously loyal, cats were incredibly selfish, horses were mostly insane and snakes were surprisingly good at mathematics.

But they could get down all the way to insects. It wasn't much fun being a fly as they had about as much brain as a pebble had and annoyed every creature on the Disc including, it would seem, themselves. It was hard to work out how they ever managed to make little flies, though they seemed to do it in prodigious numbers. But flies were easy enough, not like bees.

Tiffany had learned early that there was no such thing as _a bee;_ there was _a hive_ and then there was _The Swarm._ She had difficulty coping with a hive, highly intelligent though it was, because it felt a bit like being aware of your own cells, so she generally left The Swarm to itself. Moo, on the other hand, loved it.

It was hard to assess Moo's happiness level as it started somewhere between really pleased and ecstatic, and then went up from there, quite steeply. But she always got her biggest buzz off the bees. And being with Margs. Tiffany had a best friend; _so_ best that she thought she would lay down her life for Agnes if it came to it. Though it would be thought hard to describe how someone could possibly feel more for another than that, it was as nothing compared to how Moo and Margs felt about each other.

She'd first felt this when they'd been sitting up with Moo after the _mysterious incident that had happened somewhere or other_. She'd wondered sometimes in the past if Margs had a bit of witch in her too, but now she wondered if she had a bit of Good Witch in her, because that night, she would swear, she actually _felt_ how much Margs cared for Moo and how worried she was. And it was an awful, awful, awful lot.

Then one morning she had woken to find Moo standing by her bed looking tousled and excited, but as that was the way she looked most of the time, Tiffany didn't give it much thought.

"Mizzz" she said, "therezzz zzzome little blue men in the kitzzzen, who zzzay they want to zzzzpeak wizzzz you."

"Moo, have you been at the bees again?" she asked, mock sternly, "you know I've warned you about that."  
"Beezzzz? Yezzz, Mizzzz," said Moo, as incapable of lying as ever.

"Well, give yourself a shake," Tiffany scolded, "you need to clear your head."

Moo's obedience gene kicked in and she literally gave herself a shake. Tiffany managed to suppress her laugh.

"Better now?" she asked.

"Not quite, Mizzz," replied Moo, and shook herself again. This time Tiffany couldn't stifle a giggle.

"Did that help?"

"Yes, Miss, all better now."

"Good, because I've dealt with these wee, blue men before and we'll need clear heads; just to decipher their accent."

There was no sign of them in the kitchen, where Moo had seen them, and no evidence they had been there, but that was their way: a place was either going to be completely untouched, or a complete wreck.

"Come oot, come oot, wherever you ur; the game's a bogey," said Tiffany.

One tiny, tattooed, kilt-wearing package of bad-temper emerged from behind the biscuit tin and the other popped out of the coal scuttle.

"Hullaw, Big Lassie," said the less diminutive of the two.

"Do I know you?" she asked.

"Naw, but we know you, Mistress Tiffany. I'm Magnus Og and this is Lachie Mór."

The Nac-Mac-Feegle really did have ideas above their stature. She was surprised that Moo had even seen them, especially with a headful of Beezzz, though she probably shouldn't have been. It wasn't just their tiny size; it was the furious speed at which they moved that made them almost invisible to _bigjobs_. In fact, some _bigjobs_ couldn't see them even when they were being beaten senseless by them. Not that a Nac-Mac-Feegle would tend to attack a _bigjob_ as though he needed to be _mob-handed_ ; "Oh, the shame of the thing!" A fight between a six-inch Pictsie and a six-foot man was barely a contest at all.

Their interests were few: cattle-rustling, fighting and drinking almost unbelievable quantities of whisky. Tiffany and the Wee Free Men went way back, so she knew her duties as a hostess.

"Would ye tak a huge dram an tell me aw aboot yersels?"

"Aye, hen," said Magnus, "And everythin they said aboot ye is true."

Moo watched in astonishment as Tiffany took two small glasses –about half the size of the little men themselves- and filled them to the brim from a bottle of whisky that she kept under the sink for just such occasions.

"Aw, ya wee brammer," said Magnus, as he and Lachie drained their glasses in one. Moo thought that much whisky would have knocked her unconscious, but the little men seemed completely unaffected and just held out their empty vessels, which Tiffany dutifully refilled.

"Now," she said, sitting down and motioning Moo to do the same, "tell me why you're here."

"Weel," said Magnus, Lachie was a fighter not a talker, "oor Kelda has been talkin tae your heid bummer…"

"You mean Nanny Ogg?" Tiffany interrupted.

"The very wummin," said Magnus.

"And what have they decided we're going to do?"

"Go doon to the Big Place; there's fichtin tae be done. And there's loads a coo beastie and huge drams tae, so we've been telt."

Tiffany knew enough about the Wee Free Men to know that they would happily have travelled all the way to Ankh-Morpork just for a good ficht; the easy availability of beef and whisky was simply an added bonus.

"And why are you telling me this?"

"Fur we're away the morra and we're tae meet ye there."

"And how long will it take you to get there?"

"Oan these wee legs? A while, mibbe a while and half."

The Nac-Mac-Feegle didn't reckon time as others did, so Tiffany was forced to work it out for herself. It was a long way to the Big City and they did, indeed, have very short legs, but what they lacked in stature they more than made up for in stamina. They would run there for most of the twenty-two hours in the day, stopping only to snaffle coo beastie and swally huge drams where they could find them. Tiffany thought it would still take them about a month.

"Then we'll see you there," she said, when she had finished calculating, "Give my regards to Big Senga."

"Wull dae, missus," said Magnus, and they were gone.

"What!" asked Moo, her eyes like saucers, "were those?"

"Those, my child, were the Wee Free Men, and we're going to be going on a long journey fairly soon."

"Yipee," yipped Moo, clapping her hands.

I wouldn't _yip_ too early, she thought, it's far more likely to be pee.

122


End file.
